A Brand New Framework Owner (October 2024)

[Helena]

Sorry - I forgot. Is it a good idea to update the bios first before going ahead and installing?

[Robin_Tubungbanua]

I have a fw 13 with Ryzen 5 and I’m booting it with Zorin Os.
And its working really great out of the box, just the usual issues you see with linux machines like fractional scaling being one of the major issues I stumbled across.

Battery life is about the same as when I had windows 11 booted, somewhere around 6-8 hours of battery life on power saver mode with light workloads like reading stuff on blogs or watching a few videos.

I also rely a lot on batter power, so it has been a struggle when I actually need to work on something heavy. contemplating upgrading my battery to the 61wh if possible

[inffy]

@Helena

Which Linux Distro and version is the most compatible - I want to install Linux but, don’t really mind whether I use Fedora or Ubuntu (or which version). I would like the best ‘out of the box’ experience as possible and as few issues as possible going forwards.

Pretty much anything that has a recent kernel (atleast 6.8 but newer the better in most cases) works. But if you want choose between the official supported distros, I personally prefer Fedora as it updates the kernel and few other crucial parts like a “rolling release” although with more testing before pushing to stable.

If you just want something that you don’t need to “upkeep” you could take a spin with Bluefin (www.projectbluefin.io) or Aurora (www.getaurora.dev). Those are based on Fedoras Atomic spins (silverblue / Kinoite) but handle all the “setting up” things mostly during the install without user intervention needed. They are really solid and handle updates in the background and provide on easy way to boot to an older deployment right from the boot screen if something would go wrong. The biggest difference is that graphical apps are handled with flatpaks (through flathub).

@Helena

My 2nd important issue is power / power efficiency. I only ever connect to the power for charging. The rest of the time, I run my laptops on battery. And in my case, I run all my devices on solar power, via batteries. I always shutdown, and rarely use sleep. But, based on the best distro and version for this laptop, I also would like to know the best way to optimise power efficiency (of the various options - TLP etc.) - most of the time, I am a light user - no games, just email, libreoffice etc. And would charging via USBC all the time be OK

TLP is not recommended with the AMD and you should default to the power-profiles-daemon that comes pretty much by default on ubuntu/fedora etc.
Charging through usb-c is the only option anyway (you need a brick capable of PowerDelivery standard)

[amoun]

@Helena

And in my case, I run all my devices on solar power, via batteries. I always shutdown, and rarely use sleep. But, based on the best distro and version for this laptop, I also would like to know the best way to optimise power efficiency (of the various options - TLP etc.) - most of the time, I am a light user - no games, just email, libreoffice etc. And would charging via USBC all the time be OK

Though I don’t use the newer AMD, I have an older 11th Gen Intel

• I use solar out in the woods

• I have the laptop plugged in 99% of the time

• I have the battery charge limit at 78%

• On browsing etc. it uses about 10W
  So where are you regarding solar and waht capacity do your photvoltaics have.

• I Dual boot with Win 11 and Ubuntu

• As I use Win 11 to control my charging system Victron solar charger i usually hibernate so no power is used when off… Takes 8 secs to GRUB option and another 8 to login.

• 100W cable should be ideal

@Helena

Does using the SSD expansion card use a lot more power than an internal SSD? I was intending to install a power efficient Hynix Gold P31 that I already have and is hardly used. I have ordered a 1tb expansion card as well and was debating whether to use that for an occasional use Windows install or for data.

I found the SSD expansion card I bought a 256GB drops occasionally and eventually died in the first year. I have a replacment but I dual boot from the internal NVMe. That’s only 512GB and is more than enough. I use the expansion card as backup for all personal data

[James3]

Power usage:

1. The laptop can do pcie gen 4 but gen3 is a bit slower but more power efficient. You mentioned “Hynix Gold P31” which is gen3, so a good choice.
2. The next item is RAM. The more ram, the more power it uses. Choose as little ram as you think you can get away with.
3. Screen refresh and brightness. Set to a low refresh and low brightness as you feel comfortable with.
4. keyboard leds use 3W power, so switch off keyboard leds during the day
5. you mentioned you run off laptop battery most of the time. It is slightly more power efficient to leave the laptop plugged into external power all the time.
6. keep an eye on cpu temps and watts, and adjust you usage to keep those down. E.g. some web sites use more cpu than others. Turning on add blockers will reduce power usage.
7. both Ubuntu and fedora are well supported and work equally well and will run apps like libreoffice just as good as each other. You can run Windows in a qemu/virtmanager/virtual machine if you wish. No need for a separate disk for it, thus saving power.
8. things like powertop help you to see where power is being used, but bear in mind some of the setting cause instability if set to “good”. E.g. keyboard problems, missed keys, unwanted repeat keys.

[amoun]

Hi @Helena

Some comments on the post by @James3

@James3

Choose as little ram as you think you can get away with.

Consider 2 x 8GB rather than 1 x 16GB if you want a bit more speed between CPU and RAM

@James3

keyboard leds use 3W power, so switch off keyboard leds during the day

Mine uses a max of 1W on the highest level, there are three levels of brightness.

Power button brightness can be changed in BIOS OFF|Low|Medium|High|

@James3

You can run Windows in a qemu/virtmanager/virtual machine if you wish. No need for a separate disk for it, thus saving power.

No need anyway for another disk as dual boot can run from partitions of the main and only disk, which is what I have Win11 and Ubuntu 24.04 on my only 512GB NVMe

[yessikg]

About number 3, the only issue with not expansion cards in the slots is that now you have to deal with the sharp edges of the empty slots. I have not seen any wear and tear and I switch my expansion cards fairly frequently

[amoun]

@Helena

I generally don’t use more than a couple of usb ports - 1C and 1A in daily use. I was thinking of only connecting other expansion cards when needed - would inserting / removing them a lot cause failure from the additional wear and tear over time? Perhaps long term framework owners could advise?

• 1 permanently in USB C to power
• the 1 USB A will draw power in sleep but is different in two slots.

As far as the sharp edged go you can use ‘snack drawers’

The USB C are just pass through and use no power so you can keep as many of those plugged in permanently.

You can have an SSD expansion card for backup ~ always pluuged.

I have

• 1 USB C
• 1 USB A
• 1 x 256GB SSD
• 1 x µSD

I see no reason to remove them and hence there is no wear on the internal USB C ports.

So what expansion cards do you envisage using occasionally and how often ?

[Helena]

Thanks for this. I will use PPD.

[Helena]

I bought the expansion card with a view to installing Windows on it as dual boot. But, others think it would be better to use it for data and dual boot on my internal SSD. I could use it for backups as well, possibly?

[Helena]

Sorry but, what are ‘snack drawers’?

[Helena]

Thanks for this. I hoped to take advantage of the ability to change my expansion cards according to my requirements for different tasks.

[amoun]

There are plain/empty ones

The SNACK Drawer V2: Back in Snacktion

Introducing the newest SNACK Drawer! This new drawer builds on the flaws of the old drawer to make all your drawer fun even more fun than it already was. [RenderPromo] Buy Now! Physical Drawer: $3 + shipping Digital Files (.stl, .3mf, .step): $8 Updates: No more flimsy tabs Open without having to lift the laptop Robustified lugs make sure the card will not fall out of the expansion slot If you previously bought a SNACK Drawer or the digital files, expect an e-mail soon with the updated…

There are also advanced ones you can put a dongle in

Dongle Hider

@Greg_Smith1 My Unifying Receiver is one of the older ones, so it likely has a bigger PCB. If you’d like I can upload the step files which can be modified in something like Fusion 360 so you don’t need the piece of rubber holding it in. My measurements weren’t incredibly precise to begin with. For example the side blocks aren’t close enough to the USB housing so there may be a little bit of play in there but should be enough to keep it straight so the USB-C connector goes in and out without pr…

And dual dongle plus with a USB A port

[Helena]

Very useful to know that about turning down the keyboard leds as I will mostly use the laptop during the day and would only need the minimum brightness.

[Helena]

Thanks - these will be very useful for me.

[Helena]

Thanks for this. I would prefer to use Fedora if it is as well supported as Ubuntu. And I will definitely switch off the keyboard LEDs unless I need them.

[amoun]

@Helena

Fedora if it is as well supported as Ubuntu.

They are the two Linux that are officially supported.

@Helena

I will mostly use the laptop during the day and would only need the minimum brightness.

As mentioned there is an OFF by default

[Helena]

Thanks to all of you for all that really useful info. All I need is my laptop to be delivered and I will be ready to set up m laptop and also now to optimise it for my specific use. Hopefully it will be here soon!

[Helena]

Re Robin’s reply re battery power, I asked ChatGPT before placing my order and it thought that the Ryzen 7;processor with the larger 61watt battery would be more economical in light use than the Ryzen 5 with a smaller battery. I would be interested to know your thoughts on that?

[Robin_Tubungbanua]

I decided on the 5 because I thought it uses less power than the 7, as well as being cheaper. I dont really need the power of the 7 yet for most of what Im going to do. I think chat gpt may have dropped the ball on this one

Swapping batteries should be easier