12th gen Framework laptops seem to be lingering on batch 2 for quite some time now, it seems.
I’m guessing many people (if they’re a forum visitor here) are taking a more cautious approach to the next purchase / upgrade given the existing issues.
I’d be curious to know where that 2-3 weeks came from in that support response because the community posts and my own experience show the RTC battery will drain in about a week to unusable levels without a reset.
If that was instead a reference to the improvement of the 12th gen boards that’s not very reassuring; I’ll get an extra week or two until the same issue appears.
Anyone who ordered a 12th gen board willing to test the drainage when they receive it? At this point with no official response (probably waiting for everyone to drop out of the warranty period) I’d only trust the community to test these claims
The fact that they still need this (below) is not very comforting…:
I read this “rare” instances as unresolved.
Yes, definitely move to a new thread if possible.
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Ah my apologies, I did not realize this was related to general battery drain as I saw the RTC messages mixed in. I’m in favor of splitting it out to not derail the OP
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I also bought my Framework for intermittent use for video and audio calibration and hobbies where I may be outdoors or away from AC. I typically only use the laptop for 30 minutes at a time with several weeks between. Every single time I’ve gone to use it, it will not boot without plugging in to AC even if the internal battery is 60%+. When I get into Windows, the time is off and it won’t connect to the internet until I manually set the time (Windows 11 won’t auto sync if the time is too far off). It is infuriating and completely unusable for me.
I bought this laptop because I wanted to support what the company is trying to do but this is the behavior expected of an extremely old computer with a dead cmos battery and should not be the behavior of a brand new expensive laptop that has only seen a handful of hours of use total.
I have Lenovo and Apple MacBook, even cheap Chromebook that can go unused for months and boot up just fine without AC for a quick task.
I have been on 3.07 since 5/1 and no improvement. Is there a real fix coming?
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I did. Support just replied and advised to charge for 24 hours and reset RTC - same as posted here in the forum. My support ticket as stated is that after some period without use, frame work laptop will not boot unless I plug in AC - even if there is plenty of juice in the battery. Support replying to tell me the fix is charging for 24 hours and resetting RTC is obvious that that are missing the point of the ticket entirely. I do not want to have to charge for 24 hours every time I want to use my laptop. There is 60% battery power or more in the main battery - it should boot up and just work. If I needed to be tethered to a wall, I would buy a desktop OR if I am out camping away from an outlet, I want to be able to power on my laptop for quick 10 minutes of use, I shouldn’t have to connect AC first.
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I don’t need to reset the RTC as it is now. I have to connect AC power. I want a solution that doesn’t require me to connect AC power each time I go to use the laptop even though the main battery has plenty of remaining power (and also require manual setting of clock).
I don’t understand what the reset is supposed to solve as it doesn’t fix the issue of requiring the AC again in the next 2-3 weeks.
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Just to note, there seems to be two paths to start up the laptop once RTC battery is drained:
- The processor is not in a bad state: Plug in USB-PD to power up.
- The processor is left in a bad state (really low voltage?): Board reset and RTC battery pull is required.
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Support asked me to perform several troubleshooting steps, then offered to swap my main board but then after additional prodding, admitted the issue will not go away even with a new main board. They stated “This has not been an issue for the majority of customers” which means this has been an issue for at least SOME customers. I strongly encourage everyone in this thread to open a ticket letting them know you do not agree.
Does anyone else feel like framework has been evasive in admitting this is a design flaw? It took several back and forths with support before they finally admitted that there is no hardware OR software fix planned.
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This is the exact issue. Is there unusually high idle drain from the main board that made framework choose this rather than a traditional multi-year design that other computer makers use? I don’t understand why they won’t admit this is a problem.
Compare to a 12 year old ThinkPad and it’s pretty embarrassing.
I don’t want to take away from this. I wanted this to be a machine I keep for a really long time and support the framework mission of transparency and repairability. The build quality is great but my experience with CMOS and laptop clock batteries has been that it’s so rare that I have to replace them that I just can’t understand what is going on here. I’ve never had to manually set time on any tech I’ve ever owned as much as I have had to on the framework laptop. It’s just a super poor user experience so much so that I don’t even want to use the machine anymore.
The transparency… Or lack there of is the biggest concern I have given how framework started.
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I think most people won’t find the RTC thread by searching and instead will find this one when searching for the symptoms of the framework laptop not powering up unless it is connected to AC power. Since the discussion is continuing in the other thread, I thought we probably need to link to it again:
I had an unusual issue that occurred with my Framework laptop.
I have not used my Framework laptop for almost a month. Last night I decided I wanted to charge the battery the format a external drive to use as I want to dual boot with Windows and Linux with the laptop. I connected the power supply and noticed immediately the battery charge light didn’t turn on. So I attempted to turn on the laptop and nothing, not even the power light on the finger print reader/power button came on.
I removed the modules except for 1 and nothing… Tried connecting the adapter directly to the port and nothing. Next I thought it was the battery so I took the keyboard off but also check the connection on it and it was good. Disconnected the battery and reconnected the power and nothing. So I look at the CMOS battery thinking it could have gone bad and I need a replacement but then I saw it said rechargeable. I decided to take the CMOS battery out and waited 10 seconds to take a gamble and see if the CMOS needed to clear.
Put the CMOS battery back in and connected power back and the charge light came back on and I can turn on the laptop but it take a little for POST to kick in but it is working now.
I just found it odd. Could the reason be is because I had it not used it for so long and the CMOS battery needed to be recharged and/or reset by removing it?
Has anyone else experiencing similar issue?
Thank you
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This CMOS battery pull is required in the case where the Intel processor is in that ‘stuck’ state, caused by low CMOS battery voltage…if I’m not mistaken.
In some cases, the processor doesn’t get into a stuck state, and the CMOS battery pull is not required. Just need to plug in the USB-PD.
Current known workaround to avoid either cases all together is to make sure that you:
- Charge the CMOS battery fully to start with, by having the laptop plugged in for 24-hours. AND
- Plug in the laptop at least once a week, for 8 hours.
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It’s a design fault. Waiting for framework to come up with a fix.
Fingers crossed. Otherwise return it if you can or sell it before it gets out to the mass tech media.
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So we agree it’s a faulty product?
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I also wanted to add to this. The reason the laptop takes more time than usual to load on first boot after reseating the RTC battery is that it has to retrain the RAM. This also happens on desktops when changing RAM, or I believe when clearing CMOS on those as well, and will take longer the higher RAM capacity is in the system.
Below is someone’s blog about this issue. Thanks, someone! I plan to use this page as a secondary reference source (it’s like a second option, not a primary source) for this topic on the Framework Wikipedia.
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I’m glad to see some reviewers are able to concisely summarize this issue and get it out there for people. Thanks for sharing this.
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