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If you're a PC hardware geek who's been dreaming of a laptop that you can upgrade far beyond the life cycle of a typical machine, Framework's modular notebooks must seem like a miracle. The American company has a straightforward pitch: What if your laptop could be nearly as customizable as a desktop, with the ability to swap components out for repairs and upgrades? What if we could put an end to disposable hardware? We were intrigued by Framework's original 13-inch notebook and its Chromebook variant, despite some rough edges and a basic design. Now, with the Framework Laptop 16, the company is targeting the most demanding and (arguably) hardest group of PC users to please: Gamers.
Framework has already proved it can build compelling modular laptops, but can the Laptop 16 cram in powerful graphics, a fast display and other components to keep up with the likes of Alienware, Razer and ASUS? Sort of, it turns out — and there are plenty of other tradeoffs for living the modular laptop dream. Hardware quirks abound, battery life is mediocre and it still looks like a totally generic machine. But how many other notebooks could let you completely upgrade your CPU or GPU in a few years? Who else offers a customizable keyboard setup? In those respects, the Framework 16 stands alone.
[...] I was genuinely bummed to discover that it was a fairly mediocre gaming machine, at least for its high price.
What do you think? Is having a laptop that you can upgrade more important than having the fastest laptop on the block? What price would you pay for being able to upgrade your hardware?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by SomeRandomGeek on Tuesday March 19 2024, @07:59PM (2 children)
I just built a new desktop gaming PC this weekend. It made me stop and ponder modularity, and my attitudes toward it.
First off, upgradability my ass. My PC has a motherboard with a AM5 CPU socket, PCIe5 graphics and storage sockets, and DDR5 memory sockets. What that means, for those of you who haven't been paying attention, is that if I decide to upgrade in a few years, I will discover that the AM6, PCIe6, and DDR6 products that are on the market then are not going to work with my motherboard. So, if I decide to upgrade at that time, a more accurate description will be that I am building an entirely new computer, with a few parts scavenged from my old computer. Like the case. The case will be perfectly acceptable in the next generation.
Second, my computers are built to last. I'm getting a new computer. My daughter (age 9) is getting my old computer. She needs a computer that is better than what she has now, but it doesn't have to be great. My daughter's old computer is getting scavenged and repurposed. I grabbed an old hard drive from 2015 (the newest one in it) to top off the storage on my new box. My son scavenged the RTX 1060 in it for the graphics memory. Apparently that will allow him to run larger ML models. My mother in law is getting the balance, which is being converted to Chrome OS. So, modularity is important to me. Because eventually someone will want to cannibalize these parts and use them as a router or something like that.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Ox0000 on Tuesday March 19 2024, @09:00PM
I agree with you, and in addition would like to offer a different way of looking at it: while you're right that a desktop is not as 'upgradable' as it is made out to be, it is more extensible. It's significantly easier (and somewhat cheaper) to extend what you have in your desktop than it is to do the same with a laptop.
Personally, I prefer a desktop over a laptop, purely because of the "umph" you can pack in it. I don't use that desktop for gaming but for compiling and building stuff - which is not to be understood as a diss on gaming because that has a place as well in this space.
Occasionally I'll (have to) run a simple Node.js app, at which point my desktop grinds to a halt... (that is a diss!)
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 20 2024, @02:31AM
AM5 socket is new so it'll be around a while?
PCIe6 will be backwards compatible? And PCIe bandwidth isn't limiting the framerate of games much. If you put an AMD GPU w/ PCIe5 into a motherboard with PCIe4, it will only drop a few FPS.
DDR6 yep it won't work.