OS: Windows
BIOS: 03.06
My Framework 13 is less than a year old, but I’ve been having quite a few issues with overheating, and now charging. According to the Framework Control app, my battery is only pulling less than 5W of charge, even though I am using the original cable. It also claims my battery health is 87% which is surprising since I got my Framework this past May. I’m a student, so I mainly use it for schoolwork, streaming, and browsing.
I’ve been meaning to buy some new thermal paste since my laptop has been regularly reaching high temperatures while doing light browsing or gaming. I hit 101C playing single player Minecraft 
.
I was just curious if anyone who had the same issues had any tips or ideas of how I can solve this problem. What thermal paste do you guys recommend? How can I charge more efficiently?
87% only after less than a year is low health, overheating is a contributing factor.
You can use $ sudo ectool battery (read the Desired current) or $ sudo ectool chargestate show (read the chg_current) to read the battery’s allowed charging current from the EC, which can be a very low value at high temperature.
If you have an Intel mainboard, you can also read the battery temperature using $ sudo ectool temps all without modifying the EC firmware.
If you are on Windows, use Framework Control, which may have different commands to read(as opposed to change/edit) the “desired” charging current (can be in a different name), which is larger or equal that the real-time charging current. If the “desired” current is too low, either the battery is overheating or damaged, in the latter case, open the input cover and physically observe whether the battery swells. If the “desired” current is high, check the power management. I don’t know where to read the PCH or the buck-boost’s temperature so you may want to search on other topics posted on this forum.
If the charger or the cable is only rated 60W, charging power can be within single digit if you are playing video game at the same time.
In the case of overheating, clean dust and/or repaste the thermal using PTM7950 or PTM7958, the latter is available for purchase at Framework, you can buy the larger one for FL16 or FD and crop it to match the size of your FL13. Better CPU heat dissipation reduces the thermal transfer from the mainboard to the battery, prolonging the latter’s life.
Edit: I didn’t see the battery on your screenshot clearly. Its 40C the battery’s “desired” current should be near max
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I think I will end up buying some new thermal paste or a new battery. I’m on Windows, so I use Framework Control and I have the original 60W charger. This is the first time I’ve had issues with charging. Over the past maybe month I’ve had slight issues with battery draining, but nothing to where I thought I needed a new battery. I noticed yesterday that my Framework wasn’t charging and then last night I charged it for ~ 12-14 hours and it only got up to 80% when I opened it in the morning. Do you recommend those thermal pads over traditional paste? Do you think this is an issue I would need to replace the battery for?
Is it possible that Framework Control has a bug? You can test it by uninstall Framework Control, restart the computer, unplug the charger, shutdown the computer, wait for 1 minute. Then plug in the charger and measure the charging power
