Acer’s Asprie Vero Laptop
…at least on the sustainability side of things.
Doesn’t really change anything, no? The more, the better. Looks to me like two distinctly different approaches towards the same goal. Framework goes a lot farther in some aspects and Acer in others.
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Good news in a way, but “upgradeable disk and ram” are hardly new concepts. No promise of motherboard upgrades, for example, and probably not much open source in there. Still, “baby steps”…
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This laptop is interesting, but I would be hesistant about calling it competition until more information is available about it. Acer hasn’t released its specifications, its price, or even what parts of the world they plan on selling it in.
In addition, Acer’s press release and other media coverage of this laptop focus only on sustainability, not repairability. For example, the Verge’s reporting on Acer’s press conference suggests that this is a normal laptop containing some recycled plastic:
I asked if Acer has done anything to increase the Vero’s durability — given that e-waste is a cardinal sin of electronics manufacturing from a sustainability standpoint — and [Acer CEO] Chen said it will have Acer’s usual warranty and that he expects it to have the same lifespan as any “normal” PC.
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When a new market is growing, the competitors can appear later. But in my opinion, there is a big difference between a company that started with a mission first and another company creating a product as a way to gain a profit. If a company starts with money or a market first, they can easily stop it when they cannot gain the profit enough.
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In my assumption, if a company which already has their laptops will apply the Framework’s business model seriously, it is destructive for the company’s existing laptop products, that is called “The Innovator’s Dilemma”. So, it’s hard for existing laptop companies to do it.
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acer doesn’t exactly have a good track record for repairability so I’ll hold my breath.
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upgradable HDD and ram is just going back to how things were for years before everything became soldered and not user replaceable. Not exactly ‘progress’, more like backtracking on previous poor/anti-consumer decisions.
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There has been discussion around this for a long time (since I was at Uni);
https://www.google.com/search?q=the+inevitability+of+sustainabilty
But it takes someone to give the first option, Framework is evidence that consumers will pay extra for sustainable products, so other companies will need to change to compete.
All current Framework owners need to hang in and support a generational upgrade to keep them in business. They have the right idea though, no skimping on the fundamentals (screen quality/brightness, keyboard travel and feel, materials/size/weight). Hopefully the current core chassis design supports a few gens of new technologies.
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