The Framework Laptop Mainboard is now available in the Framework Marketplace. You can order one today in the US and Canada with newly reduced pricing. We’ll also be bringing it to the UK, Germany, France, Netherlands, Austria, and Ireland soon. We designed the Mainboard from the start as a standalone module to make upgrades easy in the Framework Laptop and to also work great as a high-performance single board computer using Intel’s i5-1135G7, i7-1165G7, and i7-1185G7 processors. All you need to do is insert memory, plug in a USB-C power adapter, and hit the tiny power button on-board, and you’ve got a powered-up computer. You can also pick up parts like a Bottom Cover Kit, Input Cover Kit, or Battery from the Marketplace extend your setup with.
Even better, we want to make it as easy as possible to build new projects and products that use the Mainboard. We’re happy to share that we’ve released a GitHub repository of CAD and electrical documentation, all under an open-source Creative Commons license. In addition to 2D drawings of the Mainboard to help you design your projects, we’ve released two 3D-printable reference designs. One is a minimal VESA-mount holder that lets you attach the Mainboard to a monitor or TV, while the other is a fully featured small form factor desktop case. Both of these are easy to print on home 3D printers. Since these are open source, you are free to modify, remix, and redistribute them however you’d like to. All of this is a starting point for a broader set of open source Mainboard documentation to enable creation of fully compatible third-party Mainboards in the future.
To accelerate the ecosystem around the Framework Laptop Mainboard, we’re giving away 100 i5-1135G7 Mainboards for free to creators and developers! If you’re in a country we currently ship Framework Laptops to and you have an idea for a project that can use a Mainboard, you can apply for one through this form. We can’t wait to see the incredible cyberdecks, arcade machines, network appliances, and other wonderful things you all create with them.
To round things out, we have a few other exciting announcements:
We’ve made it much easier to find a great Linux distribution to use on your Framework Laptop with a new Linux compatibility page. We’ll continue to update this to point to the latest setup guides and community threads.
We’ve enabled volume ordering of up to five Framework Laptops in a single order in the US and Canada. If you’re interested in larger quantities, you can connect with the team to discuss your needs. We believe the Framework Laptop is uniquely well aligned to small and medium businesses that want deeper ownership over their hardware.
I think the Linux guides really got overshadowed here. When was the last time a modern hardware vendor produced a professional quality from-zero beginner’s guide to install Linux on their hardware, acknowledging the current limitations and suggesting workarounds?
This makes the OS family just the slightest bit more accessible to the complete newcomer, and I’m very happy to see that.
I really like the idea of a VESA mounted case for a NUC form factor. I’d be curious to see if anyone is able to make a NAS type system like with the JONSBO N1.
The initial post was pretty specific as to what the github repo contained. I see a pinout document there which goes into great detail on the individual pinouts found on the mainboard. What you seem to have expected was not promised or hinted at.
I think they are selling the 11th generation CPU with a discount and when all the mainboards are sold they will start selling the 12th generation mainboard.
I see on the motherboard a few spots for connectors where no connector is soldered on. I’m curious, will there be any info available on them? Maybe if one of them has USB 2.0 data lines it could be used to solder in a Logitech dongle internally or add other small functionalities in.
