Frame Work 13 Power Issues

Community Support
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My company is currently using 26 Frame Work 13 Laptops in our fleet and were going to update to 40 units. We are having issues with power suddenly shutting down and not coming back on though. So far we have 3 laptops that are showing this issue.

I’ve gone thru the forums, and possible causes range from people speculating on the CMOS Battery, which non of my laptops have, to Main Board issues.

To date, Frame Work support has been negligible. If this is a known issue, Frame Work needs to get on the ball and issue a recall or send out new boards. I can not have my Physicians down because they can’t use their laptops.

Working with Frame Work support is a challenge on its own. It takes a couple days for them to respond and then they want pictures of everything in the computer before they even get to a possible resolution.

Has ANYONE gotten an actual solution for the power issues these laptops seem to be facing?

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You should probably say exactly which type of Laptop 13 you are talking about.

3

12th Gen x2
13th Gen x 22
Ultra x2

4

Have the batteries been ‘calibrated’ on your end? (You should if possible).

My guess is that the charge statistics are off / drifted over time due to various reasons such as self-discharge, charge estimates (are always just best guesses)…etc.

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My thought as well. Takes guts (or insanity) to put your business on the line like this. At least have a fallback plan (like alternative hardware supplier with a fast deployment / dispatch plan).

(Framework or not, new company, in any field, has some inherent risk(s)).

There’s a distinction between personal interests, vs the interests (well-being) of the business. I feel this got a bit of a mix up here. (Maybe?)

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The description of power issues is pretty vague. To figure this out or for someome to be able to say they have the same problem way more specifics need to be included.

Symptoms?
What ends up fixing the issue? Root cause?
Which 3 laptops are affected out of the fleet?
What OS?
What has been ruled out?
Are there reports of fan noise or heat?
Are they plugged in or on battery?

I’ve had crazy issues in almost any fleet Ive had experience with. Including Dell, Lenovo and HP. I would be swapping out those machines immediately and testing internally.

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8

Moved your thread to the community support category .

I only see one support ticket on my end and it looks like the support team is currently waiting for some pictures from you to investigate this further.

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1 of the laptops is a 12th gen, the other 2 are 13th gen.
All systems are running either Windows 10 or 11.
None of them have any power at all when plugged into a PSU or when swapping to a fully charged batter.
No LED indicators, internal or external.
Have tried following the MB Reset instructions on all 3 with 0 results.

All three were working fine one day and then after a power down, nothing.

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Hi @Richard_Lakely,

The last message posted gives a little more insight as to the issue(s).

Did all of these devices happen to have a really low battery or run completely out of power to the point they shutdown?

The symptoms you are describing as unresponsive (plugged into power, fully charged battery swapped, etc.) sound like something going on with the: 1. embedded controller 2. Hardware fault (these are just my opinions) .

For the time being just ignore everything about the CMOS battery being bad. Most of those issues are for the 11th gen boards (the very first model of Framework Laptop).

Presumably this has been checked to use a known good 60w-100w charger and known working USBC cable.

Try plugging in one of the three laptops that will not start with the USBC cable on the BACK left or BACK right ports as you are facing it like you would use it.

Make sure you are NOT going through a dock; just straight power with a charger. (As a sanity check here plug in another known good Framework Laptop to make sure it takes a charge from the same cable/charger setup)

  1. Plug it in and wait 60 seconds. Don’t open the lid, just let it rest.

  2. Open it and press the power button once (should still be unresponsive but in case it springs to life). Wait 15 seconds.

  3. Gently press and hold the power button for a solid 20-30 seconds. Then release and wait for 10 seconds.

  4. Press the power button once.

This should ideally reboot the embedded controller on the motherboard.

TL;dr

I am typing this at work on my phone so hopefully it comes out understandably. As a side note, you are likely very capable as an IT person for your company. My advice is just trying to be really clear as to what I think might be the case and the steps I would try in your situation with the knowledge I have to date. My steps sound elementary and is not meant to be insulting to you or others.

Ideally, someone else might come across this same issue when searching the forums and I hope everyone will be able to do some self-diagnosing and help themselves.

I find it quite commendable that you have Framework Laptops in a medical office setting. Personally I feel this is a great use case for these devices. You can have a few hot spares and parts on hand to keep everyone running so they can do their jobs.

The ability to quickly and easily replace parts puts these devices so far ahead of the usual case of if it is broken or not working it has to be sent out, or take it apart, try to find the parts, wait for HP/Dell/Lenovo to ship the new one, figure out how to transfer everything over.

2 Likes
11

Sounds like they could have died open circuit or have a short if none of the full EC reset/power down steps are working. Do you have a USB-C power tester yet? Or a wall outlet tester? Knowing what wattage/amperage it’s pulling out of the powersupply can help narrow things down.

I would try removing all modules, wifi card and nvme and seeing if the board now boots. If that doesn’t work I would go further and remove the board from the chassis and test externally on a non-conductive surface. There is a small integrated power switch just up and right of the right sodimm slot.

How close together were the 3 failures time wise?