Tech enthusiasts don't understand what budget hardware means.
this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2025
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If they can make a decent 2-in-1 in the $500 range, it would be massive. It doesn't really need great specs, the major issue with these laptops are build quality and battery life.
I really doubt they will.
The thing to note about Framework laptops is the "starting price" is literally just the system board, the screen, standard American keyboard, and the laptop body. You have to add your own RAM, SSD, all the expansion cards, a charger, and a Windows license (if you don't use Linux). There's a reason why the starting cost for a Ryzen 13 is $750 and a "pre-configured" system is $1100.
Sure they'll save some money from using a plastic body instead of an aluminum one, but that's not the bulk of the cost, assuming they're still committed to using the same system board form factor as the 13 & 16. I'd consider it a win if they get a fully configured 12 for sub-$800.
Also Trump's tariffs have to be factored in for US buyers.
Also Trump's tariffs have to be factored in for US buyers.
Oh yeah I forgot about tariffs. I was converting US prices into local currency and then went on the website and was confused by why they were charging so much less than a direct currency conversion would suggest.
They're also using an older cpu in these and only one stick of ram to run costs down. It is a low tier 13th gen intel.
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I would love to have a color epaper display option on a machine like this.
Epaper refresh rates are utter shit, it’s a cool idea but not practical except for in bespoke devices like the remarkable
Having such niche features available as modules is a big part of the value proposition Framework provides.
It would be very useful to people who don't consume multimedia, especially writers and certain types of hobbyists and office workers.
Touchscreen, budget? I suspect we have different ideas of what a budget machine is. Doubt I will be buying but best of luck to them anyway.
Several manufacturers make budget laptops with touchscreens. For what reason? People are fucking dumb. My gf sadly has one of those. A shitty intel i3 laptop with a touchscreen. Completely hardware malnourished but hey you got a touchscreen.
What is wrong with an i3? As long as you are paying i3 prices there is nothing wrong with that.
Nothing really. It's just that you could probably get an i5 withput touchscreen for the same price.
Well it depends on the price of the laptop. My partner has ryzen 3 and touchscreen although she didn't care for it having touchscreen. Mostly because it was reduced by a huge amount though, its regular price would not have been worth it.
I don't think she got it discounted. I just dislike touchscreens on lower spec machines exactly because they reduce the actual value of the device as it tends tp then have worse internals to accomodate the touchscreen and thus is less likely to last longer.
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I had a touchscreen laptop for years and only used the screen if the touchpad was broken for some reason. a touchscreen is just not ergonomic in laptop form. the yoga-style screen should make it much more useful.
my use case would be for occasionally reading music on a music stand, and to run an audio mixer with a tablet style interface.
I'm in the same boat, but it is worth mentioning that the screen folds back on itself. It can be used as a tablet and has stylus support.
That's what they meant by "yoga-style screen".
Ah, missed that
I dunno how people can knock the option. I can't stand using a laptop without a touchscreen.
Quick interaction with small elements at distances across the screen? Absolutely I'm preferring poking the screen over the touchpad.
I would never drop the touchpad in favour of a touchscreen, but I feel it when the touchscreen is missing.
I think most people's alternative to a touchsceen is a mouse, not the touchpad.
Sure, but what about when you use a laptop on your... Lap?
On a couch, bed, bus, plane, train, waiting room chair, etc.
Thats actually solid, id have bought this over my current tablet if its around 500$ No good convertible touch screen options below 1k. You can maybe put linux on a tablet with a keyboard case but thats pretty jank compared to this.
Nits could be higher, prob fine for indoor use tho, any lower than 400 max is rough in bright environments.
Bought a second hand surface pro 8 and put fedore on it. It is very good.
I do like 2-in-1 laptops, but I've had a pretty rough experience using them with Linux. Automatic screen rotation, deactivating the physical keyboard in tablet mode, summoning/dismissing the on-screen keyboard have all been pretty challenging in various distros I've tried. Looking forward to reviews of this -- I'm hopeful these sorts of things won't be a problem with non-proprietary hardware!
Framework laptops are built with the intention of Linux being a first-class citizen. They work directly with distro maintainers to ensure compatibility. There's even a Framework-specific image for Bazzite.
Even if they are problems, odds are we will have enough information that someone will fix the drivers (meaning we can fix them), and the other code bugs will be fixed.
If you want to help buy a few and spread to your favorite desktop environment developers. I'm sure KDE e.v. can put you in touch with some student who writes code and would love to get a laptop this nice. (I'm a kde guy so they come to mind first, but I'm sure Gnome or the others can as well)
I've had an Acer Spin 5 and Dell Latitude 7440 2-in-1, and with regards to autorotation and keyboard disabling, it has just worked out of the box for me on every distro I've used (apart from Arch which needed an extra package for rotation). The keyboard disabling also works in BIOS on both laptops, so perhaps it is done at a firmware level for these laptops. Some of my friends have trouble with the keyboard on their HP 2-in-1s.
Summoning the OSK is okay on GNOME, you just need to swipe up from the bottom of the screen, but the experience with the keyboard automatically popping up is worse on Wayland :(. Generally my experience has been the opposite of yours though, it has been quite good!
Hopefully the framework will drive more attention to this area though, the OSK is a particular pain point I think, Windows 10/11 does a great job here.
Please just give us physical mouse buttons as an option.
And a TrackPoint.
If it costs under $700 I would consider it :3
Cool! Maybe I'll pick it up if it doesn't suck with Linux.
Next, make one with a nipple and mouse buttons and I'll buy another. My Thinkpad is getting old.
I hope they release a keyboard with a nipple, preferably blank so I can add a dvorak layout to it
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