Yeah, the Framework is definitely quite a fair bit louder than the X220 when under full load (I have both of them, and X200, X230, W520, W541). The Framework laptop’s fan is louder than all of them individually…but it’s the thinnest of the bunch, so there’s that too.
Having said that, I do wish the Framework laptop fan can be quieter. Maybe through tuning the noise frequency coming from the fan.
I definitely get fan noise. It’s less than desirable, but I always chalked it up to the fact I haven’t done any power tuning yet on my Fedora install. Any time I load up a web page with video on it, be it YouTube or Reddit, my fans start ramping up. I can’t speak to Windows users though. It might be a better experience out of the box.
Think the issue might be what’s “obvious” to one person isn’t obvious to another. e.g. Does Windows Update installing updates in the background have the same degree of obviousness to everyone? Or plugging in a new device (and windows is trying to automatically install new driver in the background)…etc.
From my usage, I only ever really hear the fans kicking up whenever I start a particularly heavy compute process (namely compiling a new Linux kernel or kicking off a Rust cargo build). It’s not horribly loud in my opinion though. Compared to some other laptops it might be a bit louder when it does kick in, but general day to day usage rarely ever triggers it to run at full speed.
To be fair, though, I’m a little biased in that I use a mechanical keyboard (loud) and tend to work from a home office that has three desktop towers running constantly, each with several mid-range fans (which means a fairly constant fan hum in the background)… So fan noise may not register as much for me. 
Oh, I LOVE this! but… How? 
Is this limited to Linux? Or is there an specific application for that (similar to Asus Armory Crate, Lenovo Vantage, for example)? Is this only on BIOS? How much control does it actually really give you?
If it’s not too much trouble, can you show a few screenshots of this? (only when you have time, of course)
It should be possible in BIOS and under Windows you could try the App SpeedFan.
I haven’t gotten around to try it on the framework yet, as I wasn’t to bothered by the fans but I guess it should work.
I also know that there are programs to fine tune the power usage (my brother uses one) but I can’t tell you the name right now.
On Windows, you can disable turbo boosting via power settings. Google around and you’ll find a registry key that shows this option again.
Beyond that you can use the power saving modes, by clicking on the battery and sliding it all the way to the left. This changes the TDP settings for the chip, such that it pulls less power. Less power means less heat.
Now your workload is going to determine the rest.
As a point of reference, I have 6 workspaces with about 13 programs open. These programs range from music player and browser to things like VMWare Workstation (with running Linux VM) and Visual Studio. The temps stay right around 38-42 C. The fan noise is inaudible to me. My work environment at home and in the office are not whisper quite.
I’m running Linux now with the exact same workload (program wise) and the temps are the same.
My personal opinion is that the fan noise on the Framework laptop is not louder than the x220t and x230 that I have. Both are significantly louder, and their fans are ALWAYS running.
Notebookcheck:
X220t: https://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Lenovo-ThinkPad-X220T-4298-2YG-Convertible-Notebook.60217.0.html
X230 (max 39-40dB(A)): https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-X230-2306-2AU-Laptop-Review.75317.0.html
W520 (max 39-40dB(A)): https://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Lenovo-ThinkPad-W520-Notebook.53220.0.html
Framework (max 47-48dB(A)): https://www.notebookcheck.net/Framework-Laptop-13-5-Review-If-Microsoft-Made-A-Repairable-Surface-Laptop-This-Would-Be-It.551850.0.html
Maybe time to re-paste those ThinkPads you have if you haven’t done so. (To make sure they’re still functioning in-specs)
Having said that, capability / speed of the CPU come into the picture: Framework being the newer / faster laptop, it can handle more processing in shorter time. i.e. Old systems will be under load for longer…and longer fan on time. But the older Thinkpads are incapable of being louder than the Framework laptop (their fans are not as loud).
Or maybe your hearing / ears are just less sensitive to the fan noise frequency from the Framework laptop (predisposition).
Batch one 1185 user and I don’t think I’ve ever heard the fan. Maybe, just maybe, when I installed Windows 10, but that’s it.
Probably not doing intensive enough tasks to max out the CPU.
I would say definitely fans are louder than other laptops I’ve used but they are linked to cpu intensive tasks. It’s not like they randomly ramp up. General usage for i7 hasn’t needed the fan to spin up. Although as they say YMMV.
11th gen here, using Linux. Idle desktop, word processing or simple websites = completely silent.
Complex websites or the occasional compiler run = moderate swoosh noise; pretty much tolerable (no high pitched sound components).
Video encoding or playing 3D games = very audible “wind noise” with a slight hight-pitch buzz. Yes, there are more silent laptops with comparable computer power but only A1 CPU powered ones or bigger ones. So, I’d say in the market of Intel subnotebooks you are getting quite what can be expected within the boundaries of the technological base.
Have you installed & configured intel VA API video acceleration ?
chrome://gpu/
I haven’t explicitly, so if that’s not something included with Fedora or Firefox, then I probably haven’t. I’ll definitely look into this. Thanks for the tip!
It is loud, but for me, it ONLY comes on when I’m doing very heavy CPU intensive tasks like rendering video files or gaming. 99% of the rest of the time, it’s completely silent.
I echo the previous post, essentially silent for normal operation, and I run Qubes, so my normal operation means ~14 VMs running concurrently. Really pushing the CPU load will get the fan on, but I’ve never found it to be exceptionally loud, at least compared to most other laptops I’ve used. Vast majority of the time I forget it even has a fan on
The fan noise was very significant particularly as Win 11 opens from shut down for me (USB-C dock connected with two monitors). I carried out the following changes to set turbo boost to ‘Efficient Aggresive’ (didn’t disable completely) and this did help for a number of weeks, until the noise just started again. I’m going to try turning off Turbo Boost entirely. Reddit - Dive into anything
Fan is very noisy. At startup, and also during any windows update or other seemingly trivial tasks. I have 13th gen and it is quite annoying. Had I known about this I would have bought something else.
Windows user here, framework 13th gen, fans are terribly noisy. Startup and windows update are excruciating. Disappointing.
The Framework laptop is the best laptop I’ve ever had, but it’s getting a lot of bad press about fan noise recently. I’ve only had occasional problems with fan noise when running more demanding apps. However, when I installed Virtualbox under Ubuntu-MATE 22.04.3 and tried to run Windows 10 as a guest OS my laptop fan was so LOUD it was terrible trying to use it. The CPU load was not very high, but some of the cores were reaching 100C and making the fan run at full speed.
I trawled the Internet looking for a solution and soon realised that this is a well trodden path. I discovered lots of people with the same problem and negative comments by reviewers about fan noise. Until now, I’ve been using my Framework 12th gen. laptop for tasks that don’t require much CPU, but I want to use it as a desk-top replacement and the fan noise is a BIG problem.
The majority of work-arounds and fixes that I’ve seen are aimed at stopping the OS (Linux mainly) from ‘boosting’ the CPU. This is not much use for BSD or Windows users and I did some experimenting with the BIOS settings. The base frequecy of the 12th Gen Intel Core i7-1260P in my 12th gen Framework laptop is 2.1GHz, which is fast enough for most of the things I want to do. I don’t really need the turbo ‘boost’ to be enabled by the OS kernel, so I’ve disabled “Intel (R) SpeedStep™” in the BIOS - No other changes.
I now have a quiet Framework 12th Gen laptop that can run two Google Chrome profiles. Mozilla Thunderbird, several terminals and Windows 10 under Virtualbox with core temps around 50C with the fan spinning slowly and almost silently. Before, most of the cores were idle and one or two peaked at 100C when boosted. Now, none of the cores are boosted and performance is quite acceptable in return for the peace and quiet!
As you can see in the second picture, I have a HDMI and two DP monitors connected: I saw reports that these might be the cause of the fan noise, but it was just the same using only the laptop display…
And, @Matt_Hartley, yes I am running the oem kernel you suggested 
Bye,
Tony Travis
