Framework as much upgradable as other laptop and computer brands

Creators & Developers
1

Is it only me, or does Framework feel less and less upgradable every year?

Framework laptops can’t support more than one small battery. Using two or four batteries is impossible.
The CPU is soldered, which removes any real CPU upgrade path.
There are no truly upgradable GPUs — only limited, proprietary modules with strict power and ecosystem constraints.

The Framework Desktop motherboard uses soldered RAM, giving users no option to install standard RAM sticks or freely choose between DDR4 and DDR5.

The original idea behind Framework — real upgradability, longevity, and user freedom — was genuinely exciting. But today, many other manufacturers already offer similar repairability and modularity at half the price, often using standard components instead of custom ones.

Instead of expanding openness, Framework seems to be moving toward custom, locked designs. That goes directly against the philosophy they originally promised.

A message to Framework

Framework, you are starting to sleep on early, temporary success.
Strong branding and a loyal community are not substitutes for delivering on long-term promises.

True upgradability means:

  • open standards

  • real user choice

  • competition between component vendors

If upgrades only exist inside a closed ecosystem, that’s not true freedom — it’s just a friendlier version of the same old model.

The idea is still great.
But the execution is falling behind the promise.

Time to work harder, Framework — not just market harder.

1 Like
2

Which Laptop offers upgradeable CPU/GPU for half the price?

I might buy one of those.

7 Likes
3

You cannot ‘freely choose between DDR4 and DDR5’ unless you are also going to change the CPU and any memory-related chipset. The decision to solder the DDR5 devices on the mainboard for the desktop was covered very well in the posts which described the design of the system.

As far as upgradability goes… I haven’t had a laptop in the last 8+ years which was upgradable at all except for the wireless cards and SSDs. No port changes, no input device changes, nothing else.

8 Likes
4

Please name a mobile CPU that has had socket in the last 5 years? Also, when has there ever been a GPU upgrade for a laptop? As for the Framework Desktop, please find me a computer (Desktop or Laptop) with a Strix Halo APU that has removable memory and also socketed. Strix Halo is a mobile chip. Where is this freely choose between DDR4 and DDR5 coming from? The only recent chip that has had that option is the Intel 12th Gen Desktop Chips, but it does require a different motherboard to accomplish.

On a personal note I can download the bios for my FW13 and it includes .cap files, also a bootable EFI version. I could not do that on my previous Lenovo laptop. The only option was to use Windows and a .exe file. The motherboard on that system had a failure and needed to be replaced. Lenovo offered one for more than I paid for the laptop and it was never in stock either. With Framework you at least have the option to buy another system board/part and if it has been a few years maybe a newer upgraded part for a fair price.

Framework is still a young company and they are not perfect. They have problems, but they do their best to resolve them. Sometimes a fix takes time and is not done in a finger snap. Please name a company that is perfect! I have given them a chance by buying one of their products and I paid less in doing so. I am better off already. If in a few years I buy a new system board, replace the battery, replace the keyboard, or upgrade the screen and keep using that device I am still better off. If Framework is not for you then go elsewhere. I wish you luck as I do not know of a company that offers what you want.

Best Wishes!

2 Likes
5

While I admit framework isn’t always perfect and honestly I wouldn’t recommend their laptops for everyone because you have to at least want to tinker a little or be willing to take your laptop apart for it to make sense to get a framework. But I haven’t seen another laptop manufacture that lets you add a dGPU to the laptop after the fact without possibly replacing the entire mainboard or usually having to get a completely new laptop. Not to mention they have offered mainboard replacements with upgrades for the 13 for years and finally for the 16 and none of the other brands have, It is just buy a new laptop if you want an upgrade.

I do agree that I wish we had more customization and more options for things like display and more than just 2 dGPU options, I can understand the complexity of finding and getting parts to fit and work. As for as being more open standards, it is possible they can’t because of who they work with, like Nvidia has been known to be extremely controlling on their partners and the fact that we even got a Nvidia dGPU for the framework shocked me. If you wanted things to be completely open you’d have to start looking at things like RISC V and maybe someday that will be usable by most people but not today.

On the subject of socketed cpus, they don’t exist to for mobile, they are designed to be soldered to the mainboard. I don’t think framework is going to call intel and amd and ask them to spend time researching and developing their current line up to be able to socket them in. Plus CPUs need to be paired with chipsets and those have never been socketed, Which means if you did want to upgrade just your cpu you’d have to get a new mainboard anyway.

The framework desktop however, that one did puzzle me. Calling it a desktop seems short sighted as desktops by their nature are often modular and upgradable and with the exception of PCI-e and storage and power supply, it is a lot less upgradable than traditional desktops. Still they did go into detail that they tried to get the memory modular and worked with AMD to try and make it happen but it just wasn’t possible with the nature of the platform, which loops around nicely to the socketed cpu argument, you can’t just add pins to a cpu designed to be socketed and call it a day.

Also you can’t freely choose between DDR4 and DDR5. The memory controller that actually talks to the memory is in the CPU and it is up to AMD and Intel to design their CPUs to support one, or the other, or both. In the case of 12th, 13th, and 14th, gen Intel CPUs intel designed their memory controller to work with both DDR4 and DDR5. AMD on the other hand didn’t design their current cpus to work with anything other than DDR5. And again if you wanted something like this then you’d be looking at something a lot more open like RISC V where you could design your own memory controller that could possibly support both standards.

4 Likes
6

They’re a small company hence there are not many options. Assuming they follow through with their promise of maintaining compatibility through years of growth to the size of Lenovo or Dell or such, then we will have the upgrade utopia they promise. Right now only the repair aspect is really developed.

2 Likes
7

Need only 4 swapable things. CPU, GPU, RAMS, BATTERY (to add two or more or bigger one).

8

Sorry, but did you even read the responses?

Socketable mobile CPUs no longer exist. Intel and AMD do not make them. And Framework certainly does not have the power to change their mind about that.

GPU, we have it. The FWL16.
They even by some miracle managed to bring us one from Nvidia! Who are notoriously difficult to work with. And who several people suspected would fight against a modular mobile GPU. Due to its potential to cut into the more lucrative desktop GPU market.

RAM, we have it as far as it is possible. Read their blog regarding the desktop. Strix Halo wasn’t possible, but they still wanted to work with AMD, build stronger connections with them.

BATTERY, we have it.

With laptops, you use all the space that’s available, for battery. You don’t leave empty room in the body for another or a bigger one.
For the FWL16, yeah, it could use the option of an extra battery using expansion bay. Hopfully they are working on that, however slow it might feel.

5 Likes
9

What you want is a 3” thick laptop. All I gotta say to that, is no thanks. :smiley:

1 Like
10

I don’t know what laptops you are referring to from other vendors but that said, agreed on the open standards point. Aren’t we at a point now that we can expect the Framework mainboard/screen/maybe other components to be based on an open standard? One that other manufacturers are free to use?

Or is this already the case and it just hasn’t caught on yet?

11

They should first publish the UNSEAL code for the battery management system or use the default value so the user can use custom tuning for their custom battery module.

12

If I name them here, I will be banned for promotion. You already know that they put mobile CPUs like AMD Ryzen™ 9 9955HX3D and AMD Ryzen™ 9 9955H on very small factory boards with at least two DDR5 RAM slots, two NVMe Gen 5 slots, and one PCIe slot, allowing you to build your own laptop or a super small form-factor mini PC.

For a motherboard equipped with AMD Ryzen™ 9 8945HX, they ask around €400, without RAM, SSD, or anything else—just a small motherboard with a heatsink solution, so you can work on your next DIY laptop or mini PC project. I found two larger companies and one individual who sells DIY slotted motherboards that he makes himself, and I only searched for about 10 minutes.

I think Framework would gain a lot of respect if they showed, next to each part they sell, the manufacturing cost plus the price they paid for the AMD or Intel chip. Chinese manufacturers that make, for example, GMK boards, are very open about how much a similar board costs to produce and how much the AMD chip costs, not including RAM. They usually list RAM pricing separately at factory cost.

Do not get me wrong—I am thankful to Framework for creating a laptop motherboard with a RISC CPU, but the CPU is soldered, not slotted. I wish it had been slotted, so that when a newer RISC chip is released, we could simply replace the CPU instead of changing the entire motherboard.

That mini PC motherboard with Ryzen AI Max+ should have slotted RAM, not soldered. Also, motherboard manufacturers often want to whitelist components in the BIOS, such as RAM sticks and other hardware. I am not saying Framework does this, but whitelisting should not exist on Framework products, because newer components may come out and users may want to adapt them to a Framework motherboard.

13

I believe this misconception is caused by CPU manufacturer prospects that usually mention something like «supported RAM: DDR4 or DDR5» without any clarification that it is a mainboard manufacturer that selects either of them, but not both.

People do not understand that DDR4 and DDR5 pinouts are different and incompatible, so as their slots :person_shrugging:

2 Likes
14

Yes slots. DDR4 slots or DDR5 slots. Should have slots not just welded rams.

Tell me there slots on these motherboards ? You know why EU great ? We have law passed in right to repair if one or few ram chips gets bad i cant replace them without expensive equipment, because i need heating station and special tools to put new chips instead of slots.

15

This board uses soldered RAM for very specific reasons that Framework’s CEO himself exhaustively and repeatedly explained when it came out. I’m sure you can ask your chatbot what they are.

1 Like
16

I agree. Socketed CPU’s, for instance, were already practically a dinosaur back around 2016–presumed extinct and an anomaly to see alive in the wild. FW isn’t offering them because no major manufacturer really does them anymore.

1 Like
17

Because they save money on everything and this is same reason nowdays boards not holds as long as old ones who still work at my house. Properly socketed device gives you ability to add another ddr5 chip without welding its repairability. Apple glues some memory on board so what we now have to have glued memory motherboards ?

I tell what we want. We want modern motherboard with plexibility and repairability Lenovo W701 have :slight_smile: This is was framework ideology then this company was created.

18

Part of the problem is when companies abandon certain tech, you lose the processes that made them too, eventually. Like how floppy disks aren’t made anymore despite the process for creating magnetically-coated tapes/films still being around. A lot of the in-between stuff specific to the technology in question is eventually thrown out. You possibly could revive the needed tech, but it’d be an expensive, low volume niche use case with limited demand. In other words, expensive with very limited ROI. Hard sell.

19

Wow, sometimes you can’t just can’t win. @Ernest I disagree with you here. There is no consumer laptop out there that is as upgradable as the Framework 13. I love my Framework laptop, not only is it upgradable, it runs Linux flawlessly.

20

Here is an off the wall idea.
What is the problem with soldered on RAM? Answer: Its difficult to change.
So, what if one could come up with a method to unsolder and solder new RAM on, that was easier to do?

  1. Surround the chip with heat proof covering, so other components are not damaged when a user unsolders it with a heat gun.
  2. Put some heat sensitive labels on the chip, so the person with the heat gun, knows to heat it up until the label changes from say Black to Green or Red. The Green being the right temp, and the Red being a little too far, letting the user know to back off.
  3. Add some test circuitry in, so the user can press a test button, to check all the solder balls are correct before powering on the whole laptop.
  4. Maybe have the solder pads slightly wider apart than they normally are, making them easier to solder, even if they take a bit more space up on the PCB.

Thus, needing much less skilled, than a solder expert, person to change a soldered on RAM chip.