Framework Laptop 13 review: a DIY dream come true

[nrp]

I'm happy to answer questions that folks have around this product.

[DanHulton]

Why, oh why have you gone with the terrible "bar-style" arrow keys instead of t-shaped? Apple similarly made this mistake, and thankfully recanted. It was so miserable to use bar-style arrow keys that I've officially sworn off of any keyboard (or any machine with a keyboard) that has them.

[princevegeta89]

Hi. I have an m1 mac but always missed linux since I got it. Here are my questions if you can take a minute:

How stable is the Linux laptop and what distros are officially supported? What would be the best possible battery life I can get out of that 13 inch Ryzen version that was recently released?

[itscrush]

I'm having the worst time hunting down a Cooler Master Mainboard Case ... seems like y'all have not had these in stock the numerous times I've checked, today even, https://frame.work/products/cooler-master-mainboard-case. Any inside info for us from Cooler Master on supply or ETA on stock from your sales page?

I've tried direct with Cooler Master. The online store has 3 pages of cases, https://store.coolermaster.com/us/cases-2?pagenumber=3 none included Framework's. Next I checked CM's 'find a store' which dead ends at suggesting Micro Center or Game Stop, which neither I find carry them.

I don't have a 3d printer on-hand and don't think this warrants 100-200$ printer purchase. Should I go hunt around for some folks to help at a local college or hobby shop instead?

I certainly can see up-cycling my 11th gen mainboard into a homelab asset with proxmox this year though. Without a mainboard case for this 11th gen on-hand though, I'll also not consider a mainboard upgrade.

Any insight or guidance?

[juujian]

Any plans on FOSS stuff? Option to ship with some linux distro, dedicated linux support, maybe even libreboot or coreboot?

[javajosh]

Will you ever stop iterating on the chassis and focus purely on the replaceable components? Seems to me that a reparable/upgradable laptop doesn't matter if you keep changing the chassis such that in order to enjoy new features you need an entirely new laptop every iteration. It also feels to me, as an 11th gen owner, that I've been left behind with my power and sound issues. Which is basically the same boat as any laptop user.

[csdreamer7]

Hi, thank you for founding Framework.

Love my 12th gen framework laptop except for an issue with the headphone jack. Waiting on a replacement for that.

I do wish the keyboard was better. See the Thinkpad. Using the function key for terminal paste + home and end forces me to spend a second to think to shift between this and my Thinkpad keyboards. I know you are coming out with magnetic ones-really looking forward to that and hope they match the thinkpad.

[loufe]

Any efforts going into OLED/AMOLED/MiniLED displays? It's my biggest hesitation point.

[deadmutex]

Can you please elaborate on why the new mobo is so much more power efficient? If anything is due to software (e.g. BIOS), will you be able to backport these changes to previous version?

Also agree with reviewer's comments about privacy shutters being hard to see. My family members have complained about "laptop['s webcam] doesn't work" when the shutters were closed. This caused unnecessary bad experiences with using the laptop.

[j01]

Have you considered the option of allowing purchase without some components, e.g. storage? Plenty of people buying a new laptop already have an SSD.

[chabad360]

Are we going to see improvements to the pricing overtime (and not just for last gen mobos)? Even the OP mentions that a roughly identical (spec wise) Dell laptop is $350 cheaper. It's rather hard for me (and even harder to convince someone else) to swallow that much of a premium.

[rowanG077]

I have been wanting to design a framework case for my own use. Unfortunately the way I need to mount the motherboard means that the air in take is on the other side then it is in the Framework laptop. Would it be possible to either flip the fan or run it in reverse mode?

[gubneor]

Better control over the power LED would be good -- its blinding in certain environments

[deivid]

I have a gen12 i5. The thing I am dissappointed with is battery life. Will a motherboard swap to AMD significantly improve on this?

[lousken]

Kinda related - any plans to expand the list of countries you ship to this year? Though, I am waiting for the 16"

[collsni]

How does performance compare between your Intel and AMD flagships?

[ecliptik]

Any plans for more official FreeBSD or OpenBSD support?

[spruengli]

Any chance you can dispense with the logo?

[atribecalledqst]

I'm definitely thinking about getting a Framework, I could use a decent Windows / Linux laptop for random hacking (and some light gaming). Might wait until the next model comes out though since I don't have any immediate need.

Being able to replace components in my 2012-era Macbook Pro has saved me a number of times and a laptop that's built around that ideal sounds great to me.

Are Frameworks generally in pretty high demand and hard to get? Like when the next model comes out, can I basically expect that it will be impossible to get for a while?

[mkozlows]

They're a small company, so at launch they meter them out through pre-orders. If you order now, you have to wait for later "waves."

Once they're out for a while, though, they're just normal "pick one up and buy it" things.

[toastal]

The bad (addendum): poor display panel options. No upgrades to DCI-P3 coverage, OLED, etc.

[mustaflex]

It would be nice if Framework can share a roadmap for availability outside U.S (I'm from Belgium) for all their products.

[albertopv]

We shared during our event in March that we'll be adding Spain, Italy, Belgium, ... | Hacker News https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35967906

[iamnotamouse]

I like my 2022 framework, but the Linux support has been disappointing.

I've had off and on display issues: both the built-in display, which used to constantly freeze (now less so), and external displays which sometimes will stop working until I switch kernels. Battery life is awful -- it'll last maybe 8 hours with the screen off (doing basically nothing, but not sleeping). A few hours of actual use. Sometimes the replaceable ports stop working until I re-insert them after boot. The manual screen brightness doesn't work until you disable the auto adjustment and reboot (not sure if this was fixed).

It's about the level of support I'd expect form a laptop not specifically advertised as Linux friendly, except Linux was part of the marketing for Framework.

Just want to put this out there since this review didn't test Linux.

[hyperman1]

I wonder if it is possible for a DIYer with a 3D printer to put a mainboard in a thinkpad X220. Or transplant the thinkpad keyboard to the Framework. All electrical connections are probably going to kill this idea stone dead, but a man can dream;-)

[DreamFlasher]

I hope the review is indeed correct, my Framework Laptop 12 has horrible battery duration: Normal usage 3 hours, high CPU usage 2 hours, measured multiple times. Also the fan is constantly spinning, it's very loud and it's overheating.

[flapjaxy]

Are there any plans to enhance the sound quality in future iterations? The 80dB speaker upgrade makes it louder, but the sound quality is still lacking compared to other traditional machines.

[gubneor]

whats a traditional machine? it sounds a lot better than the system76 i had prior to it

[snapplebobapple]

I loved my initial kickstarter version of this laptop and am even happier with my 2022 model. Really looking forward to the larger model. Highly recommend these to everyone.

[cultofmetatron]

excitedly waiting for my ryzen model myself. Its such a relief to be able to order less ram and ssd knowing I can upgrade that later.

[princevegeta89]

Are you willing to buy it once its released?

[rfwhyte]

The Verge has to have some of the worst reviews on the entire internet. All they ever talk about is subjective stuff like how the product "Looks" and "Feels" and are seemingly incapable of doing any actual work to provide things like benchmarks, comparisons, charts, graphs, etc. Just more of the same low effort, low quality garbage reporting as usual from the Verge. Like how do you do an entire review and not have a single benchmark or even a remotely qualitative battery life test let alone meaningful comparisons to competitive products?

[lillecarl]

I like knowing how something feels, there's a reason people buy more expensive laptops without better performance. There are other reviewers who can provide this information. Since it's subjective I'm happy to hear as many voices as possible.

[camgunz]

I think this is pretty unfair, they do a recap of stats and include battery life and speaker loudness measurements. Like a sibling comment says, feel and experience matter also.

That said, it sounds like you'd be happier with Notebookcheck's review [0].

[0]: https://www.notebookcheck.net/Core-i7-1370P-performance-debu...

[thiht]

Honestly from my experience laptop benchmarks are easily gamed and often useless. I'm way more interested in this kind of subjective review.