Like I said, when Framework sends you replacement hardware, they’re sending you “refurbished” stuff that someone else had sent back to them because they experienced problems with it. It makes perfect sense that the problems rate on the refurbished stuff over the long term would be close to 100%. I don’t think it makes any sense to hallucinate from nothing a scenario where a toddler is repeatedly destroying the laptop.
(My sample size for this is 1, but I have this too. Framework sent me one refurbished mainboard, and I have problems with that one. The problems rate for me is 100%.)
Refurbished would actually mean it’s more likely to work because Framework actually tested it and had to verify it wesn’t broken (you’d be surprised the amount of customers returning items that were perfectly fine just because they were too incompetent to understand how to use it).
Insulting the customers because they are experiencing problems with the hardware… good stuff
I received a refurbished FW mainboard after documenting the amdgpu crash with photo and video evidence on a live USB stick environment which is one of their supported configurations. If I was managing to make the crash happen through my own incompetence and lack of understanding, I must have been very inventive about it. Not only was my refurbished mainboard’s BIOS not reset to factory values (it still had some kind of oddball settings the previous customer had left in), but it also had problems (crashes on videoconference, which the previous mainboard didn’t do, some USB audio issues which I think I have mostly tracked down, some visual artifacts). If you think this is my incompetence at work, you’re welcome to weigh in on the GH issue about one of the issues with it which Framework seems to have been ignoring for the last seven months. The guy who opened that issue contacted Framework support for it in February 2025, and they sent him a new headphone expansion card and two new mainboards, none of which fixed the problem. He’s still trying to fix it. Maybe he’s just not competent at headphones.
That was in no way directed at you. Dunno why you assumed but please know I was not referring to you.
So what you are saying is, they are just sending you mystery boxes as replacements.
And I’m totally with you on the lack of fixes from framework. Us 16 owners have been suffering since launch with various USB issues and others that are slowly (finaly) getting fixed over 2 years out.
All good man. I’m just salty about my laptop not working right. Well, that and also I’m irritated because Framework should be such a good company, and to me this bush-league handling of any customer issues is squandering so much goodwill and prestige that the engineers and founders earned through all their hard work. In addition to impacting me personally and making me irritated and wasting my time with trying to fix the laptop they sold me.
So what you are saying is, they are just sending you mystery boxes as replacements.
Yeah, pretty much. Until you get sick of it and just cope with the hardware you’ve got and start trying to solve any problems with it on your own (or just learn to live with them.)
The first main board failure was because of suspected micro fractures of solder joints. Upon inspection, however, I found the battery connector being bent and still plugged, and this caused the laptop to shut down while held in certain positions, mostly with one hand. I was lucky it didn’t catch fire for a little over a year honestly.
The second board came with an entire unit replacement because Framework sent the repaired unit to an address that wasn’t my own anymore (long story) and this one, despite looking brand new, gave me BIOS POST problems, at random, from the get go, as soon as I plugged in the SSD and RAM. Some times it would boot up, so I had to track failures and make a reproducible case out of it over the course of months - and I only finished that endeavor two months ago.
They sent me the third and last replacement in June, which came on a box that was visibly dented - however Support told me to install and test the motherboard anyway as box damage doesn’t mean motherboard damage - fair.
Now we’re at the end of August (and just about the end of the warranty period) and an USB connector out of four kicked the bucket on PD and DP alt mode - and also, Windows sometimes has suspend issues but I think that’s just software.
