Got my new FW 13, AMD, DIY version. It took all of 10 minutes to go from opening the shipping box to having a fully assembled, powered up laptop.
So I built a "whitebook’ Asus Z96J back in like 2008 or so, and it wasn’t that hard but it was definitely not this easy. Opening the packaging was harder than assembling the computer. This was so damn simple, I feel almost cheated. Anyone else ever had this sense?
Incredible engineering on the part of the entire framework team. If FW 16 has even half this level of simplicity yet polish, they ought to sell a billion of them.
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That’s what I expected but now one month of diagnostic with support later I wait for the replacement unit because the Keyboarddeck had a short and took the mainboard and display with it.
So be happy that it was only 10 minutes. Don’t get me wrong support was great but still would have loved to have your experience.
Same. I had a small correction to make with the wiring at the left hand hinge before the bezel went on, but it was likely my fault to begin with, and it certainly wasn’t a big deal.
I’m sure a small minority of people are having difficulties, and that sucks.
After reading so many complaints on this sub, I was expecting a disaster. It was going to be impossible to assemble, then it wasn’t going to boot, then I’d have the wrong brand of RAM, then the hinges would be so springy that I couldn’t read the screen because it was bouncing up and down so hard, and the neighbors would be calling bylaw about my fan noise…
For those still waiting, relax. This is a really great laptop, and the vast majority will be super happy with it.
Yup. I was stunned how easy it was to assemble my batch 3 FW 13 AMD too.
It would have taken 10 minutes if it weren’t for having to adjust the bezel a few times as the cable in the left hinge took a bit of work to keep it within the guides as I attached it.
Very impressed with the thinness of this laptop. I compared it to my Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Nano Gen 1 laptop and found its width and depth to be less than a 1" difference as expected given 12" vs. 13" screens. However, I was not expecting the FW 13 to be roughly the same thickness!
Considering I paid ~$400 for four year extended warranty with drop/accident coverage for that X1 Nano to protect my investment, the FW 13 definitely has lower up front costs.
In the first few batches of FW orders, some people bought DIY and didn’t know how to DIY. They needed a little hand-holding and even then struggled. For the veterans, it was easy peasy, with no need for special tools to remove the bottom covers or losing screws. Everything is easy to disassemble and reassemble with no problems. It even included QR codes on the bottom.
FW has changed the way laptops are made and this was the first time I bought a laptop in a long time. My last laptop was an IBM X41 Tablet convertible.
They won’t sell a billion because the price premium is still significant, and the vast majority of people aren’t even aware it exists.
Part of that premium is just being a small manufacturer… That is a premium with no actual intrinsic benefit, and even has drawbacks of its own.
Part is its unique build, which delivers benefits, but drives up costs as well.
- repairability. Most folks would jsut as soon pay an extended warranty, which is much cheaper than this premium. If you’re not a tinkerer, you’re gonna have to pay labor for fixes on this anyway.
- upgradeability. Great! Will most people care? And you’re paying hundreds extra today just for the privilege of being able to pay for those parts later as well (okay I won’t hassle about the RAM/storage, but the mainboard prices are tough on the better chips!)
- customizable deck (keyboard/input modules)… Which may not be of any value at all to many people. I’m uncertain if I care, personally, unless a touchscreen macro pad happens. I just know I want a numpad.
Those are benefits that you have to pay a lot for up front… And may not get to cash in on for years (if ever!)
And that’s not without trade-offs either.
- Middling battery life
- A decent but not “excellent” screen (no OLED)
- A lousy webcam.
- A touchpad that is a bit marmite.
- “Only” 4 ports + headphones on the 13 (6 on the . And I have to give one up for a mouse dongle. For many, built in flexibility might be more important, especially if you can’t predict your needs well, so you might be much more annoyed by not having the inbuilt breadth of jacks so long as you at least have a USB4/TB3+ jack. (Is carrying adapters around really more convenient than carrying a little USB dock? Best to carry one anyway if you ask me)
To me the real upside to the adaptors is damage mitigation. The adaptor takes the brunt of any lateral/vertical forces, preserving the internal USB-C jack.
All in all, that’s a decent bit of trade off.
For me it’s enough (I’m stalling tho. I don’t love the I). But I’m enough of a tinkerer that I’m happy to replace a failing part for damage or upgrade, etc. Hinge, Screen, Storage, RAM, being the most likely culprits, plus an upgraded mainboard at some point.
I look at the cheap Chromebooks or expensive (yet still underpowered) Microsoft laptops that my kids bring home from school, and I can’t help but think how much of a waste they are. From a financial standpoint, these Chromebooks don’t have enough power to keep up after 2 or 3 years of use, and they also break if you look at them the wrong way. If they could be upgraded or repaired, I imagine it would ultimately save money. My oldest kid has a public school-issued Microsoft laptop, one of the smaller Surface variants, and the thing is a joke. It’s so underpowered and so expensive for what it is, I can’t believe anybody thought that purchasing hundreds of these for students was a good idea. I’m pretty sure it’s like a $700 computer! If they dropped an extra couple hundred bucks, that would buy an entry level framework 13 with a newer processor, longer battery life, bigger screen, bigger hard drive, more memory, never mind the repairability aspect.
To be fair, I didn’t say they “are going to sell a billion,” I said they “ought to sell a billion.” Your points are well taken.
Personally I’m fine with the higher upfront cost if it means I can potentially pay less in the long term.