True, I hadn’t considered HDR or a color calibrated display for this yet. My assumption that I didn’t think to clarify in the original post was that a computer with dedicated graphics would need to be at least 15" to accommodate better cooling, and probably but not necessarily be 16:9 given the increased size. Sounds like 1440p is the sweet spot for that size, and spending extra GPU power on higher refresh and better colors is fairly popular, with other display technologies like touch support or other panel types also having some interest.
@Tim_Southwick Some people may ask “why would you want to get a better screen for your laptop, when you could simply get a better external monitor?”. Well, it’s more about the convenience the option provides, than the utility of more attachments. After all, unlike the Macbook design is it based on, the Framework laptop is not “feature-complete”, i.e. not everything the user will ever need is already part of the package.
Do such features make for expensive inclusions? Oh, absolutely, but “it’s better to have it and not need, than to need it and not have it.”
Folks want super fast panels?
Looks at the Iris Xe GPU and sighs. I guess they want to play Half Life 2 all day…
Maybe just a 75Hz panel eh? Baby steps…
Also ignores the obvious:
I don’t use my laptop with an external monitor.
I have a desktop computer for that.
Okey, but… your wording here seems to imply that the Macbook design has “everything the user will ever need”.
I just received a new macbook from my employer, for work. Their default send included a belkin USB dongle. Because, you know… All I would EVER need on a macbook is two USB-C ports?
Yeah, no.
Similarly, any person that wants a touch screen on their laptop (weird people, but apparently it is a thing), are just SOL with anything Apple.
I’ll assume there’s some disconnect in how you intended your post to be understood and how I read it, though.
While the Framework isn’t officially thunderbolt certified, it runs an external gpu enclosure via thunderbolt totally fine. Basically, that screen’s outpout could easily be being driven by a Geforce 3090. All you have to do is connect it via the standard USB-3 ports. Technically don’t even need the modules for that, since they’re just a passthrough…
So, yeah, running games at obscene framerates is something you can very easily do on the Framework, if you have that equipment.
But that’s a really bad setup. Using that level hardware with a laptop…on a small screen…not really portable, CPU limited, not pushing it to a 4K or 1440p screen etc. etc.
Great for the four people that might do it for a laugh I guess…
External GPU, handy for folks doing transcoding/video or CAD work but again a 120Hz screen isn’t going to help massively and you wouldn’t want to do work like that on a 12" screen.
Just because you can… The real solution…buy a different laptop in the first place. This is like buying a Honda Civic and trying to turn it into a Ferrari.
Reminder that this post is about potential 15+" framework laptops with dedicated graphics, so XE graphics or 13" and smaller displays are not a concern.
Fair enough. I was more relating to the 3090/eGPU response I got.
Each to their own I guess.
Makes sense. I wasn’t really posting that to anyone in particular, I just noticed that people kept mentioning smaller screens and integrated graphics a fair bit and wanted to clear that up
Yeah, I mean, I hear you. I don’t understand it myself (thus the quip in my reply about “obscene framerates”), but people do the darndest things. (And in the eGPU case, people really should only use it with a separate monitor since that eliminates the “there-and-back-again” bottleneck, but people still somehow decide to game on their Razer Stealths’ screens with eGPU… Guess they spent so much on those overpriced eGPU chassis that there’s nothing left for a monitor? )
“People” do also tell me that high refresh rates are “just better” even when in a desktop, sort of like how I tell people they’ll never want a membrane keyboard again once they’ve tried mechanical. If I only got to experience the smoothness myself I’d never want anything below 120Hz again, even if I’m just browsing the web. Etc.
The fact that, if this is true, I’d have to replace all monitor equipment I have on all my machines has led me to avoid trying it out. Then again, if it indeed is true, it could be an argument for high refresh rates even on the Framework as-is. After all, that’s the beauty of the product: it can be a simple option where we mix-and-match, if there happens to be enough interest.
Though I suspect touch-enabled screens will arrive before 120Hz screens.
your wording here seems to imply that the Macbook design has “everything the user will ever need”.
You misunderstood. I’m not implying that Macbooks actually include “everything the user will ever need”, I’m saying Apple designs them in a way that conveys this idea. Besides the fact that all post-Butterfly keyboard Macbooks having all of their essential parts (which, in any other laptop, would be user-replaceable) soldered and cryptographically hashed to the motherboard increases profit margins because of their lack of upgradability and serviceability, it also means that you have to buy everything you expect to use, for the lifetime of the machine, at purchase.
By configuring a Macbook, given the understanding an internal hardware upgrade path is not and never will be available, the consumer is implicitly saying “yes, Apple, this is all I will ever need”. If consumers refused to buy into this premise, the only way you could buy an Apple Macbook, as they current exist, would be to use a third-party market like eBay (because the configuration choices were already made, so the limitations are pre-determined). Otherwise, Apple would have to make their products actually upgradeable.
Ah, thanks, that makes sense indeed. Sorry for the confusion.
It’s all good. It’s just sad that this is where we are.
I get that most people are tech-illiterate. That’s why “walled-garden ecosystems” are so popular; what I don’t understand is why so many consumers are okay with not having ownership of their devices. Apple basically proposed to the average consumer a device that is really sleek and user-friendly and all they ask is to retain full rights to everything about it…and we collectively said “sure”.
If the Right to Repair implies the Right to Ownership, then Apple users don’t own their purchased products–they’re perpetual renting.
Most people who buy a car expect to have a pretty free choice in who they hire to switch the tyres or do any kind of work on them.
The consumer electronics (and farming equipment, looking at you Deere) sectors are moving in a direction where they are trying to ensure you are unable to have anything done with the item you “own” either yourself or through your favourite service center.
You do NOT have to actively care about the technical aspects, or even intend to do any repair yourself personally, for Right to Repair to be of critical importance. Indeed, on automobiles, we take it for granted.
You are partially correct. Yes, “most people can’t be bothered to understand how most things they own actually work” is part of it, but I think there’s also an element of disenfranchisement.
“Why would I bother exploring the mechanics of a laptop, when all the parts are soldered? I can’t do anything about it and it would be more economical to just buy a new one.”
“Why would I bother to look under the bonnet and understand the internal mechanics of my vehicle, when I do not have the necessary tools to do repairs on it even if I knew where to start looking, and besides, most cars are slowly turning into computers anyway.”
This, in my opinion, is one of the true costs of ownership: curiosity, either because “you aren’t qualified to understand this” or “knowledge alone isn’t going to solve the problem”. Even if you (not you specifically, generic “you”) aren’t curious, isn’t there value in longevity or is something only valuable because it’s novel, new and shiny?
Not voting since the OP only included wide screen format which are not compatible with the current chassis and would be a better vote which chassis for a framework 2 would people like.
Personally, I love the current pixel count and wouldn’t want to change it. In Gnome I just set my display scaling at 100% and then set my default zoom in my browser to 120% or 125% (depending on browser) and my terminal font to 14px. I do the same with Slack, Discord, vscode, and other electron-like apps. This makes 95% of all the text I need to read the perfect size, and the other 5% is just the tabs, menus, and icons that I actually like a little smaller.
As for what I would change on the display. The biggest upgrade I would like is better color and contrast such as a OLED or micro LED display. Secondarily it would be nice to have 120 Hz and touch screen.
I can’t can’t stress enough how much I like the current pixel counts, so much better than wide screen formats, and the scaling limitation is 100% a Linux issue which my workaround make me happy until they have a non-buggy partial scaling feature (technically I gave up holding my breath for this a few years back).
2K60 is enough for me. The only thing I’m expecting is a better 2K60 display with lower response time. Framework’s current screen has a very very bad response time.
I have no idea what either of them are. From the name, I assume it is indeed magna doodle.
95% of people don’t know the difference between RAMs and SSDs, memory and storage. For them, any computer is good as any.
However, improved recycling & repair don’t need them to know any of this. Instead of being charged $2K for a battery swap (*cough* Apple *cough*) and having to toss their machine out (and possibly losing all the data in the process), they only need to pay $500 or get the internal storage attached externally (if bitlocker is not enabled by default) to recover the data (snaps finger) just like that.
Oh I’ve visited customers and businesses that are using monitors with like 10% brightness, flickering and really washed out visuals and said “You really need to change that monitor! It’s bad!”
They just go “Really? Looks okay to me!”
Many still think the way to fix ANY computer is just stuff in more RAM. Doesn’t matter if its using a 5400rpm 320GB HDD and a Intel Atom CPU still…
I love my Framework laptop but the one thing that prevents it from being great for my use case is the screen resolution. On Linux, you need a screen res that looks good at 1x. 1080p on a 15’ laptop is wonderful on Linux. Fractional scaling is nightmarishly bad no matter what any one says. Is there any chance of a lower res screen for those who don’t want to endlessly fiddle with fractional scaling on Linux?