Wednesday, January 24th 2024
Reviewers Evaluate Framework's Laptop 16
The first press reviews of Framework Laptop 16 are now live. Check out some of the early feedback. This is the largest batch of review units we've ever shipped, and we expect more reviews to trickle in over the next week. For context on our press units, many companies ramp into production, manufacture a large quantity to fill retail channels, and cherry pick some golden units from that as review samples. For us, because we're entirely direct to consumer, our ramp is extremely fast, and units go to customers' hands immediately. That means to get press units out weeks ahead of time to provide a sufficiently long review period, we send out production-intent qualification units. The "intent" part of that is that these are usually functionally identical to what ships to consumers.
With Framework Laptop 16 though, the product is complex enough that we identified issues during manufacturing qualification that we've since fixed. Changes and improvements we've made on all customer systems include resolving some instances of audible electrical noise in the Mainboard and the Graphics Module, reducing sliding friction on the Touchpad Module, optimizing the thermal resistance of the CPU heatsink, making improvements to the liquid metal application process, fixing a couple of instances where a firmware bug could result in a blue screen on Windows, resolving an issue where the left or right speaker channel could be attenuated in Windows, improving the fan control algorithm on the Graphics Module, and a number of smaller fit and finish refinements related to the Bezel and Input Modules. In retrospect, we would have loved to get these improvements into the units we sent to reviewers, but it's most important that our customers have a system that works smoothly.
Framework Laptop 16 has the largest set of pre-orders we've ever had on a product, and we doubled our factory capacity in the second half of 2023 in preparation to work through this as quickly as possible. We're happy to share that we've started mass production manufacturing this week, with the first units leaving the factory before the end of January. These will go directly to our fulfillment warehouse in Taiwan and then out to Batch 1 customers. Pre-orders are still open, and we expect to fulfill all current batches before the end of the first half of this year.
Framework Laptop 16 Resources
Whether or not you've ordered a Framework Laptop 16, you can now also get your eyes on the setup guides and documentation around the product. We've launched a centralized resources page that has links out to all the information and tools you need. This includes beta web and desktop utilities for Windows and Linux for configuring Input Modules like the LED Matrix. We're trying something new with our step-by-step Quick Start guides as well. Since many of the modular interfaces on Framework Laptop 16 are pretty novel (for example, the hot swappable input devices), the guides have short videos for each step alongside the written instructions. Let us know what you think!
Source:
Framework Blog
With Framework Laptop 16 though, the product is complex enough that we identified issues during manufacturing qualification that we've since fixed. Changes and improvements we've made on all customer systems include resolving some instances of audible electrical noise in the Mainboard and the Graphics Module, reducing sliding friction on the Touchpad Module, optimizing the thermal resistance of the CPU heatsink, making improvements to the liquid metal application process, fixing a couple of instances where a firmware bug could result in a blue screen on Windows, resolving an issue where the left or right speaker channel could be attenuated in Windows, improving the fan control algorithm on the Graphics Module, and a number of smaller fit and finish refinements related to the Bezel and Input Modules. In retrospect, we would have loved to get these improvements into the units we sent to reviewers, but it's most important that our customers have a system that works smoothly.
Framework Laptop 16 Resources
Whether or not you've ordered a Framework Laptop 16, you can now also get your eyes on the setup guides and documentation around the product. We've launched a centralized resources page that has links out to all the information and tools you need. This includes beta web and desktop utilities for Windows and Linux for configuring Input Modules like the LED Matrix. We're trying something new with our step-by-step Quick Start guides as well. Since many of the modular interfaces on Framework Laptop 16 are pretty novel (for example, the hot swappable input devices), the guides have short videos for each step alongside the written instructions. Let us know what you think!
12 Comments on Reviewers Evaluate Framework's Laptop 16
These are a very attractive innovation, but the pricing is not in line with sanity imo. Idk how many people are going to pay a serious price premium just for the laptop to be modular.
A framework 16 with the 7840HS, no ram, no drives, and a few connections costs almost $1500. There are a number of complete laptops for $900-$1000 with the same processor.
Either way, go framework, I hope they continue to grow!
It is a cool product in a lot of ways, it would be great if even some of these ideas became more widely adopted.
Big OEMs like Dell, HP and Lenovo use this same design sinergies but throw away modularity in favor of thinner and cheap to mass produce designs, often sacrificing scale along the way.
I think the problem for framework will be scaling operations to me demand, one reason why Dell, HP and Lenovo are everywhere is not just because they're cheap, it's also because they can ship thousands of machines day by day. This on the other hand also allows them to make less money per machine which framework just can't do yet.
This laptop is quite good in overall, to me the cons are:-
1) Not enough m.2 slots. I need at least 3 slots, my current laptop has 5 and all filled up.
2) No WWAN option. while mobile hotspot is only a few clicks away, having to do this from time to time is still troublesome. Not a deal breaker anyway.
3) Not the fastest CPU & GPU offered.
4) No specific dock station. All after market general docks are not able to power on the laptop with the lid closed.
5) No dedicated PgUp & PgDn buttons, this really sucks. Up/down arrow keys are small and close to each other, same like the lousy Dell since past few generations.
6) No dedicated Home & End keys, I use these quite often, without this is difficult for me.
People looking for mobility may not buy this because of not "thin" enough. Gamers may not buy this because the spec is not high enough. Only people looking for balance in between will consider.
1 & 2) beauty of the open expansion bay module is that people can create these weird solutions, like adding WWAN, m.2 etc. This is if you are okay with not having the GPU or swapping between the GPU the the extra slots. There will definitively be a future one with extra m.2 slots, you can already get extra storage through expansion cards, and if you need storage, I wouldn't be surprised to see a U.2, U.3 or EDSFF slot be fitted in that expansion bay, letting you have a 30TB SSD if you wish. With the 8 PCIe lanes, 3D printing your own solution with slimSAS or MCIO might become a thing too.
3) I mean the 7940HS is arguably the fastest for its TDP, not sure there's a point to the 7945HX in this laptop. You're limited by the cooling solution, not the CPU. There is only one GPU offering at the moment, but the whole point is to be able to offer more GPUs in the future, including future more powerful GPUs. Again, for the form-factor and thermal limitations, the GPU option makes sense for now. Being able to swap the mainboard or the GPU sounds more like a pro than a con for the people who want their laptop to have the latest CPU and GPU.
4) 140W docking stations exist AFAIK, and unless you're running full tilt, a 100W one will do the job just fine too. The whole point of USB4/TB3/TB4/USB-C is its universality, wouldn't make sense to make a proprietary one. To top it all off, it uses the USB-C PD standard, so when 140W,180W and 240W adapters and docking stations come to market, it will be compatible with them. Again, this means this is the only laptop AFAIK that will be able to be used with a 240W USB-C PD adapter or docking station.
5 & 6) If FN+ arrow keys doesn't work for you, you can use the numpad without num lock activated for all of that: Home, End, PgUp, PgDn and arrow keys; and if that doesn't work, you can also just have whatever you want on the RGB Macropad module. It also uses QMK firmware on an RP2040 microcontroller, so you can customize all of it to your heart's desire! You can even get a Blank AINSI or ISO and do anything with that.
I feel like for people who are looking for unique features and universal compatibility, this is actually a great option, provided you are willing to tinker. Considering you can swap between expansion bays, it might give people who want portability AND gamer stuff or other features a win-win, where they can have their cake and eat it too, have the same laptop become lighter and more business-y, or gamer-y, or workstation-y. But yea, it is niche, especially considering the price, and the amount of people who are willing to tinker ( just like pre-built vs custom PC). There is also the uncertainty about how long it will take for the ecosystem to expand (i.e. different graphic options).