I think it will come down to whether or not you already like 12" 16:10 laptops. If you do, the FW12 is a great one. I was using a ThinkPad X201, so the Framework 12 was a natural fit for me. It was love at first sight honestly.
The keyboard is worse than the 7-row ThinkPad keyboard, but I would say that about literally any other laptop keyboard including modern ThinkPads.
The other thing I miss most from my ThinkPad is definitely the WWAN. The FW12 lacks both the second internal PCIe slot and the antenna wiring. I’m following this project and will buy one the moment I’m able to: LTE Cat 4 Cell Modem Card
I love the way the FW12 looks and feels; IMO it’s the first Framework product that feels like it has a cohesive design identity of its own and not knockoff-Macbook-Air style like the 13 or ugly-sharp-plastic-seams like the 16. It’s made out of the same stuff as LEGO bricks except even softer to the touch due to the way the material is textured. Framework’s inexperience with this new material was what led to the case cracking in the first few months worth of deliveries.
I did have case cracking on my July 2025 unit, but my replacement bottom cover is fine so far. I honestly don’t understand why everybody makes such a Big Fucking Deal about it, like how often are they looking at the bottom of the laptop instead of using the laptop? Big whoop, free replacement, get on with your life lol
I do like the stylus support as someone who used a cheap Wacom tablet with my old ThinkPad, not so much for art as for cleaning up my flatbed scans from VueScan in Photoshop CS3 (levels, clone stamp, spot repair, dodge/burn, done). My FW12’s display did have backlight bleed until I messed with it to equalize all the bezel/hinge/screw pieces pressing on the display in various ways. I also had to manually realign my trackpad to avoid it catching on the case in one corner; easy but wish it came perfect to begin with.
And dunno about the i3 but here’s what I’ve been playing on my i5-1334U 64GiB RAM unit:
The most-demanding game that I was able to get the best performance out of is Burnout Paradise Remastered (2018): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nE4BLRZk-Fc