I saw the Framework Laptop 16 just launched as an AMD Advantage laptop, so only AMD CPU and GPU… I was wondering if there would be plans to include other options in future such as Intel Meteor Lake CPUs early next year and other GPU options too perhaps? I know it’s very likely given the whole point is that we can replace and upgrade parts at will, but I was curious if there might be any confirmation of this and also a rough timeline? Thanks!
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Unfortunately we have no details as of yet. According to the video put out today by the Verge, the only thing Framework can confirm is that “there will be GPU upgrades” and based on their track record with the 13" laptops, I would say that there is also a very good chance that we will get different CPU upgrades in the coming years as well.
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We do not know and cannot know. Only time will tell.
Yeah of course. Since Nirav often seems to frequent the forums, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to hope that he might see this post and offer some sort of response haha.
I was surprised to find that there was no intel options out of the gate, but it also sounds like AMD was working closely with Framework and perhaps that accelerated their development. Plus they’d been working on the AMD swap for the FW 13, and likely already had that workflow spun up. I’d guess we’ll see an intel option within the next 6 months.
Personally idk why you’d go intel though. AMD has better performance and battery life last I checked. For the sake of freedom of choice though, I’d still like to see intel as an option.
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My uncle who works at Nintendo said for sure Intel and RISC-5 in the FW 16 next year! (/s)
Like everyone else said, we can’t know for sure until we have official word. But my opinion is that it will happen eventually.
Framework will probably want to spend the first 6-12 months after release making small adjustments from gathered customer feedback and support tickets. That will also make it easier for them to finalize designs for an Intel version.
Another reason to wait is that they need to recoup investment. Once all the preorders are completed, Framework will have more money to work with. They’ll need that money to fill out purchase orders & stuff. There might be a couple things that need retooling, but probably not much if the PCB is assembled via pick ‘n’ place.
I think it’s highly variable. I’m happy that AMD has made in-roads after years in the wilderness, but I will admit that for laptops especially, the hybrid CPU architectures that Apple and Intel are now using seem to be a better fit. Efficiency cores are a great way to reduce power consumption with minimal difference in performance during normal operations. And for heavily multi-threaded operations, 24 cores overall (13900HK) seems like a decent win over 8 (7940HS) even if 16 are just efficiency cores.
Intel also seems to have a simpler/better connectivity situation (e.g. 4 Thunderbolt ports on Framework 13 Intel vs. only 2 on the Framework 13 AMD).
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In the few reviews of the 7840HS I have seen, it appears it can go toe to toe with the 14 core 20 thread (6P + 8E) 13800H at the same 35 W to 45 W wattage despite having six fewer cores and four fewer threads. And also, 13900HK has the same core configuration as the 13800H, at 14 cores and 20 threads. Furthermore, Ryzen has traditionally had better idle power draw than Core, although there are a few exceptions.
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That’s a good point, I had forgotten the connectivity options are different between the two. Even more argument in favor towards freedom of choice.
Personally I’m not a fan of the efficiency cores on an x86 system because quite frankly I don’t trust the scheduler to know what tasks I want where. Granted, I love the idea of them on paper. That’s just a personal preference obviously, and I would guess it’s in the minority.
I personally haven’t had any scheduler issues with E-cores on Windows or Linux. Great performance all around for me. And while they might run the CPU outside the sweet spot for efficiency, with a little tuning, Alder Lake and Raptor Lake CPUs are pretty impressive on the efficiency front. I am most excited for Meteor Lake though. Should be a nice bump in efficiency and should also give the Radeon 780M iGP a run for its money.
I also work at Intel so that’s also part of the reason I prefer to have an Intel laptop LMAO.
I’m with you on the first point but the second point I’ll have to see to believe that XD
Sorry, you are correct. I thought 13900HX (8P+16E) and typed 13900HK (6P+8E). Intel’s naming schemes certainly stink… There aren’t a lot of benchmarks available though.
I was similarly skeptical, but now that I’m on the Apple Silicon side, I credit them (perhaps incorrectly) with the unreasonably high battery life I see.
My current laptop is on Comet Lake, I haven’t ran a hybrid chip yet. How do you check what type of core a process is on, and can you force them onto efficiency core? I’ll happily be swayed away from my skepticism.
As non-apple fan, I’ll readily admit they’ve achieved truly remarkable things with that chip. Running the M1 is basically cheating in terms of efficiency to performance.
I recall Intel showed off a utility with their Intel Thread Director which showed what was running on each core, but I don’t think that is publicly available sadly… Not that I’ve really tried looking.
As for forcing them onto efficient cores versus performance cores, I would imagine setting a CPU affinity should do the trick, but with Intel Thread Director built into Windows and Linux, it seems to do a good job on its own figuring out when to run things on the different cores. That said, I play a lot of FFXIV which is DX11, so it leaves plenty of P-cores untouched for my other tasks to use, so perhaps I haven’t tested it properly yet haha. I know some hardware reviewers have done some tests between WIndows 10 (No Intel Thread Director) and Windows 11 (With Intel Thread Director) and found that it does fix some issues that can pop up with the hybrid architecture and scheduling. Mostly on heavily multi-threaded games though.
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I really hope an Intel version is on the horizon. I just prefer that architecture. My current laptop is entering the replacement window and I’ve been wanting a Framework since the first 13s started to ship but I need discrete graphics options (and I had new laptop I couldn’t in good conscience just ditch). The 16 looks like my dream device. Thanks for starting this topic!
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Well thank you! It’s nice to see a kindred spirit haha.
Feels like 90% of the time I say I want Intel, I’m met with a flood of AMD fanboys telling me that I’m dumb for wanting a worse product from an evil company (in their opinion). Even though our CPUs trade blows with AMD and it’s crazy to fanboy over a multi-billion dollar corporation as the “underdog” haha.
It’s always a disheartening thing to hear as an Intel employee, but we’ll just keep improving our products every generation until even the fanboys can’t deny the performance 
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I’ll admit, I was really disappointed the first few generations of framework laptops were Intel only, because I personally wanted a ryzen part. With that said, I ended up getting a framework with an 1135g7 in it, and I’ve been surprised with how well it ended up working for me. The power efficiency is pretty good, especially in light loads, and I really like the tools available for tuning performance on Linux. I think people often fixate on a few key specs like multi-core performance, and power efficiency in benchmarks and ignore the holistic experience on a platform because it’s hard to quantify. There’s definitely advantages to both platforms right now, and it’s not as simple as one being the best option for everyone. I just hope the rumors about Intel catching up in igpu performance with meteor lake are true 
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I’ve had both systems over the years and have found the Intel hardware more compatible with the kinds of things I do. But I’ve always been super happy with my Intel devices. Right now, I’m splitting the difference with an Intel CPU and AMD’s Vega GPU (XPS15).
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Well, there is value to the whole “underdog” thing even if they are large. They are still not as large as Intel for sure.
There is a subreddit dedicated to AMD Laptops specifically because there are not very many AMD models to choose from. It’s very rare to see a Ryzen CPU or Radeon GPU on a laptop. Even when you find a Ryzen CPU, it’s paired with an nVidia GPU.
So you’ll have to forgive the “fans” (which BTW, is not that big either).
Comparatively, NVidia seems to garner the most fandom. Intel is a “default” so probably not so much fandom there (except in the Enterprise/Business). AMD gets the smallest fans.
Giving a sneak peak? 
Please, do tell! Excited to see Intel take iGPUs seriously.
Speaking of the subject, also hope Intel decide to improve upon Arc and have a next gen in the wings. Hopefully the first go-around didn’t dissuade them.
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