None of those things he is listing are CPU’s, so their CPU cooling system hardly seems relevant.
The way heat pipes work is as a vapour chamber, and the vapour goes to the other end of the heat pipe to be condensed.
He is listing APUs, which are a category of CPU, so the CPU cooling is very relevant.
An APU is just a CPU with a good GPU built in. An APU with a really really good GPU could potentially eliminate the need for the expansion bay to be used for a dedicated GPU even for GPU heavy tasks, which would free up the expansion bay for other things.
Leaks indicate that AMD has some upcoming super high end APUs with more than triple the GPU performance of current APUs (almost as good as the GPU module Framework currently offers). But those are expected to have power draws around 120w, or about 2.7x what the Framework 16 is designed for.
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@Kyle_Reis Would 120W of power draw not already be feasible in the Framework 16? The power brick already accommodates up to 180W considering the 75-100W + 45-90W dynamic power draw between the current 7700S + 7940HS configuration.
Also 120W max power draw from a desktop 4060 class APU would be advantageous considering a 60W headroom for expansion bay components and custom I/O on the keyboard/trackpad deck.
And some of us are speculating 240W charging support to be present in a future revision of the FW16 in coming years:
The issue is not power draw but rather mainboard cooling.
The FW16 is designed to be able to cool up to a 45w sustained chip on the mainboard. Then in the expansion bay cooling can be expanded as much as necessary to cool whatever’s there. An APU would be on the mainboard and therefore count towards the mainboard’s cooling capabilities (~45w).
240w charging support has already been announced as a feature on the current FW16. The only reason the official brick is 180w is to keep it compact, but now that PD chips (the part of the charger that communicates with the laptop) with support for 240w are entering mass production Framework has said to expect that many companies will start making 240w bricks (which will work with the FW16) soon.
The current FW16 supports 240W PD. In that post, I was responding to someone who didn’t understand 240W power adapters not being currently available.
But the current FW16 has support right now for 240W PD. As soon as a power adapter is available, you can use it.
Framework Laptop 16 Deep Dive - 180W Power Adapter
I missed that, my bad, I just glanced at the models, which are obviously names of pure GPU’s as well, but to be fair, by necessity, the APU’s would be on wholly new boards anyways, so the constraints of the current CPU cooling system still aren’t relevant.
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It would be on a new board, but in the same chassis. The current CPU cooling system appears to take up most of the space available for it in the chassis, so I doubt a new board could dramatically improve the cooling capabilities.
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would love to get these in there soon to massively increase cooling https://www.froresystems.com/
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I had thought about those as well. Given the small size it would be cool to have them in the main chassis of the FW16 while having additional cooling for a GPU module (either fans or more of these). I recall at least two videos from LTT the most recent being them putting it in a MacBook. I think they would be great for keeping the FW16 cool while also keeping it thin, light, and quiet with a GPU. Although it may currently be cost prohibitive given how new it is and how small a company Framework is. Hopefully one day!
I agree probably not till the Ryzen 9000 or post Zen series whatever that gets called
Would love the expansion bay to house an extra/more battery. I have a Framework 13 and the battery is okay at best and terrible at worst. I wouldn’t mind the extra weight if I didn’t have to carry around a charger as well. Hope to see some cool new expansion modules for the FW16 by the end of 2024.
I disagreed before, but especially now, they upgraded the cooling without changing a thing about the size, but also, it really doesnt appear to be taking up all the space, it looks like they could fit at LEAST 1 more heatpipe, if not 2, or just fatter wider pipes, in general, I would never presume to assume that a thing cant be upgraded just because its at a specific point, them not wanting to engineer past what they could reasonably use, doesnt mean it couldnt be done
But that involves a cost in monetary terms, and for what improvement - i.e. is the cost benefit ratio worth it? Probably not.
I can’t see it being a great solution, given the system fans are in there. You’re exhausting hot air next to the extra battery.
In order to put a more powerful CPU in there down the line? Almost guaranteed to be worth it, what are you even talking about?
I did some calculations.
When looking at the graphics modules dimensions, you can have a thickness of 20,95 mm and a width of 356,6 mm.
You could fit 5 18650 Li-Ion batterys in the part where the heatsink sits. Combined they would get to a lenght of 325 mm (excluding connectors or nickel strips). When using these Samsung INR18650-35E (Samsung INR18650-35E 3,6V - 3,7V 3500mAh | akkuteile.de) you could get 64,75 Wh at 3,7 V. Max constant output power would be 148 W at 3,7V.
Or you could fit 5 21700 cells when making the part a bit thicker on the top (like 2 mm higher). Combined they would get to a lenght of 350 mm (with connectors it could be a bit to long). Using these Samsung INR21700-50E (Samsung INR21700-50E - 5000mAh 3,6-3,7V Lithium Ionen Akku | akkuteile.de) you could get a stunning 92,5 Wh at 3,7 V. Max constant output power would be 181,3 W at 3,7V.
The electronic components could fit where the Graphics Module PCB sits. There should be enough space.
The weight of just the battery would be 250 g for the 18650 and 350 g for the 21700. And you could get a combined energy storage of 149.75 Wh (+ 76,1 %) or 177,5 Wh (+ 108,8 %)!
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How are you planning on cooling the CPU? The system fans are in the expansion module. There isn’t 356mm usable width with the fans installed.
The CPU heat is exhausted out the sides.
And the fans are not going in the portion where the GPU heatsink is.
So there is no problem with cooling and the width of the FW16.
If it was not obvious in the first post. You can only use the extra battery with the integrated Graphics.
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He’s talking about placing the cells in a line along the back. It would be similar to how the GPU module sticks out the back. If I recall, Nirav mentioned cells in that location in an early video talking about the FW16.
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