Framework 16 power specifications

Framework Laptop 16
1

Since there seems to be a lot of people who want hard data on USB-C charging and TDP I thought I would post my findings. I will continue to update this with testing:

Charger Power Turbo Continuous Turbo (7700S disabled) nominal (7700S disabled) GPU (turbo/nominal) Notes
Battery 40 15 60 60 “Power Saver” setting
Battery (no 7700S) 55 55 60 60
60W 36 36 60 60
65W
95W
100W 60 30 60 60 54W/50W GPU max temp: 64C
180W
Conditions Power Draw Cpu Package Power
basic web browsing, minimum screen brightness, 7700S installed but disabled. 22W, 19.69V, 1.17A 5W
Basic web browsing, minimum screen brightness, 7700S enabled 12W, 19.69V, 0.62A 5W
basic web browsing, max screen brightness, 7700S enabled 19W, 19.64V, 0.98A 5W
CPU-Z Stress test, 7700S enabled, max screen brightness 42W. 19.64V. 2.21A 27W
CPU-Z Stress test, 7700S disabled, minimum screen brightness 80W. 19.04V, 4.22A 51W (Thermal throttles)

Notes:
7850HS CPU, 7700S GPU, 32GB (2x16GB) crucial quad channel 5600MHz, WD Black SN770 2TB, kit, 2x USB-A, 1x USB-C, 1x HDMI, 1x audio, 1x 3D printed blank cover.

60W charger is a anker 736 on the “tablet” port (60W max)
100W charger is a “Spigen” arcdoc 1204/PD2100 but was also tested with the 100W of the anker 736.

Max TDP with 7700S disabled: 60W “turbo” 51W continuous. 100*C ON DIE INSTANTLY! (thermal throttling to 51W for me)

Other than as noted, all tests were performed with max performance settings in windows.

5 Likes
2

That sounds like that liquid metal solution isn’t performing as well as I would have hoped. My 13 with lm does 45W continuous with a 95C temp limit and that thing has a way smaller heatsink.

3

That sounds like that liquid metal solution isn’t performing as well as I would have hoped. My 13 with lm does 45W continuous with a 95C temp limit and that thing has a way smaller heatsink.

I am inclined to believe my unit is defective as the GPU has a similar peak power draw but peaks at 70*C

4

So I though there were some discrepancies in your data (with itself and what I thought to know).

First, your 60W Charger has lower wattages than on battery without GPU - afaik, the laptop should be able to use the battery in addition to any charging capabilities, to cover peaks in power draw.

Second, you measured power draw (I assume wall power) of 22W with the GPU disabled, 12W with it enabled for otherwise same parameters (first two tests). That seems wrong.

So I made my own quick and dirty stress test on Linux, with stress -c 16, and artificial all-core stresstest, all sustained usage.
All data from ‘sensors’, which reports PPT/socket power with amdgpu-pci-c100, battery power draw with BAT1-acpi-0, and temps among others with k10temp-pci-00c3 (those temps were by far the highest).

Power Source Power Profile Condition Socket Power Battery Draw Temps
Battery (65%) Power Save stress -c 16, Display 40% 20W 32.8W 67°C
Battery (70%) Balanced stress -c 16, Display 40% 36W 55W 96°C
Battery (75%) Performance stress -c 16, Display 40% 38W 59W 100°C
65W Charger + Bat (70%) ANY - no effect stress -c 16, Display 40% 30W 9.3W 86°C
65W Charger + Bat (70%) ANY - no effect C++ compilation, 14 threads, Display 40% 30W 5.8W 82°C, peak 95°C as it moved to fewer cores
65W Charger + Bat (75%) Power Save idle /w top and browser open, Display 40% 5.2W, average 3.2W 45W (charging?) 42°C
65W Charger + Bat (75%) Balanced idle /w top and browser open, Display 40% 7W, average 3.2W 45W (charging?) 42°C
65W Charger + Bat (75%) Performance idle /w top and browser open, Display 40% 15W, average 3.2-4W 43-44W (charging?) 42°C
Battery (75%) Power Save idle /w top and browser open, Display 40% ~4W, average 3.2W 9.85W 39°C
Battery (75%) Power Save idle /w top and browser open, Display 0% ~4W, average 3.2W 7.1W 38°C
Battery (75%) Power Save idle /w only sensor, Display 0% ~4W, average 3.0W 6.44W (or 6.9W /w minor activity) 37°C

So yes, there definitely seems to be something weird going on, at least on linux the power profiles seem to have no effect on peak power draw, only on base power draw. And since peak power draw on any AC mode is lower than on battery with Balanced or Performance, there certainly seems to be a problem.
I measured the C++ compilation times of my project (again 14 threads only), both on battery and wall power (65W):
Compilation on battery 48W peak, 42-40W sustained, 1:42
Compilation on wall power 36W peak, 30W sustained, 1:46
So I can confirm that the real-world performance is slightly lower, with BOTH on Performance power profile. Something seems to be wrong.

And in practice, the peak momentary socket power I observed on battery was:
48W on stress test on battery performance
60W on custom multicore workload with some iGPU use on battery balanced
63W on custom multicore workload with some iGPU use on battery performance
– For some more context on the workload, it’s not loading all cores necessarily, it has a sustained socket power of 35-40W, with a battery draw of up to 55W (with display at 0%) on the batter performance test

I’m running Manjaro KDE and the FW16 is configured with a 7840HS, no dGPU, 64GB of 5600MHz RAM (so a bit higher than normal power draw), and a 2TB SSD.

1 Like
5

Awesome data! Thanks for posting another data point.

Note that all my power readings for USB were using a USB-PD power meter. Something like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01NAWYSVK
(Not this specific one, mine has external power supply and just measures the voltage and current to show power draw by USB device.)

Interesting to see that it isn’t just windows power settings but that it shows up on linux as well. Maybe firmware related then.

2 Likes
6

Bit of new data, Framework replaced my FW16 with a new one due to lots of thermal issues. (Got around a 5-15% bump in performance across the board due to lower thermals on the new one.)

I also replaced my power brick with a custom PCB that outputs 28V at 5.5A (160W max from either a 110/220 outlet, or a 12V/24V source. DIY Universal charger!) and managed to get my CPU up to 40W sustained power. Interestingly, I only got a max of 40W on the new laptop no matter what I did. Very odd as I was able to force my old one to 60W with the 7700S disabled. Still hitting 100*C on the die which is concerning.

Cinebench scores did improve vs the original FW16. (13,646 in CB R23 vs 12,374 on my old one.)

@mods, could I have permission to edit my original post? (I would like to add the new data points.)

I believe based on the 3x data points (including a friend here) we will NOT be getting full performance out of the 7850H let alone the higher end CPU. They seem to cap out thermally at around 40W (out of the 54W AMD specifies.) Not horrible as this is still great performance. I will try to do some more testing and see how much total power I can draw from the USB port. I am curious if a 140W source will keep up with gaming or if I need to try to push 180W for the next standard power output. 100W drains the battery noticeably.

7

I have been using a 140W charger for gaming for a few months now. I have my power setting set to power efficiency(windows) and that keeps the power draw low enough that the battery does not drop while gaming. For the most part gaming has been pretty fine but the Monster Hunter Wilds beta convinced me to get one of those 240W chargers others have been talking about on the forums.