The 16" is a size issue and documented. It has 6 expansion cards and and expansion port.
Framework supply a 180W which is fine in most cases. You will also see someone runs their 16" on a Samsung 45W for lighter work.
The 13" is light and easier to carry with only 4 expansion ports and it can be run from under 20W supply. Still I am not sure of the ‘great’ benefits of the Intel Ultra over the AMD or 13th Gen.
The 16" is a different beast.
I have a batch 8 Intel 11th Gen 1165GT and that should be fine for many years as I’m not a gaming kid
It’s worth noting that if you want to use a 3.5mm headphone jack, the difference in usable expansion card slots is just +1 with the 16", as the 13" has one built-in while the 16" will need to use up a slot for it.
I’m unsure how much faster the new Ultra laptops are. I myself am more exited about the new screen than the processor. I also think most users here prefer AMD over Intel.
I’m waiting for lunar lake/strix. Probably lunar lake since strix apparently won’t have TB5 either and I’m mad about that. Perhaps FW will be nice and use external TB5 controllers instead of the integrated TB4 controller.
The biggest change? If you buy a Lunar Lake laptop, it won’t have separate memory sticks or chips! Lunar Lake now bakes 16 or 32GB of LPDDR5X memory into the package itself, with no ability to connect more RAM. It’s a change that reduces the power consumption of moving data through the system by approximately 40 percent, according to Intel. For those who need more memory, Hallock says a separate Arrow Lake architecture is coming to laptops later this year. This is Lunar Lake — Intel’s utterly overhauled AI laptop chip that ditches memory sticks - The Verge
I’m not a lover of SoC sort of direction though it does make battery performance better.
However I usually keep my laptops as purchased and don’t upgrade ram so ram on the chip isn’t a great idea for many I suppose it’s they way most users will go.
Most ‘device’ users want better battery and speed, not a toy to take apart and rebuild.
I don’t mind the SoC nature of lunar lake, 32GB is what I have now but I know plenty of folks on the forum require more. So Lunar Lake won’t appeal to them at all. The lack of Thunderbolt 5 is what concerns me. If Framework commits to TB5 on Strix and ideally also LPCAMM, then I’d hop on that over Lunar Lake. Depending on how I feel, I might even delay to 2026 when OpenSIL is supposed to hit Client for AMD.
For me, anything is faster / an upgrade when coming from the 11th gen. It only scored 310315 (BIOS 3.20) in Cinebench 2024…whereas my other 13980HX scored 1800. If the Ultra can score half of that, I’d be happy.
The Framework’s i7-1360p reportedly scores >1800 as well so I’m optimistic! Will probably just be upgrading to a used or back stock 13th gen board for fear of regressions on Linux though.
