I would love to see 80gbps thunderbolt, for future use with eGPU enclosures of the same bandwidth.
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Something I forgot to add in my previous post, after moving from my Macbook air to Framework, I have found myself really missing its trackpad. While the Framework trackpad is one of the best in the windows laptops I’ve used, it still pales in comparison to the Haptic Trackpad of the Macbook. I almost never used a mouse on the air since the trackpad was just that good. I know Dell with their XPS 13 and Sensel have developed haptic trackpads for their windows laptops. Would love to see this integrated into my Framework!
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I personally disagree, in the fact that while DBrand does have some nice skins, they still leave gaps and can be costly, plus even just having a second color beyond silver means that when swapping out metal parts on the laptop you can add some personality to your computer.
All that said, I would also disagree with shooting down any idea here, even a car. Nirav started this thread by saying that they want to remake all of consumer electronics, but made sure to add an (eventually) afterwards. I don’t see the point in differentiating good and bad ideas in this thread, because Framework has a lot of smart people working in the company, and they know better than all of us what ideas are good or bad for their business. If their employees and the community moderators are not taking any action, then all ideas here are valid, and no offense, but the response you added only mentioned separate input cover colors, and other than the post saying that they aren’t doing more colors at this time, Framework has never said that they will never choose to make other colored cases in the future.
The biggest reason I responded the way I did is because all you said was “Wont happen” which is not necessarily true. I added my own context so that the original commenter knew that “it likely will not happen soon, but it’s not impossible”. Unless the Framework team is much less intelligent than we’ve seen so far (highly unlikely) nothing mentioned here will risk the company’s safety, so unless a response is harmful in some way to other forum users, there is no reason to shoot down ideas imho.
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And now? Is there a result, what frameworks next project is?
How about a 11 in. super durable, repairable Chromebook with enough capacity to dual boot a lightweight Linux distro? This would be ideal for the educational market and so valuable to anyone with children. They break things easily and those lightweight, plastic pieces of junk are no match for them. I know from experience. Parents, students, and educators the world over would be thrilled!
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Would really love to see a super simple Thunderbolt/USB4 eGPU adapter (not a full enclosure), ideally low cost with less bells and whistles. The Razer Core X is waaay too expensive, and the alternatives that make sense price-wise ($170-ish) are on AliExpress, which I have less than 100% trust in. Thanks for this amazing laptop, I got it 2 days ago and am already in love!
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Well, still no hinge though!)
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The most obvious for me is a tablet. Mostly because I’ve pushed their age quite a lot. I cannot stand a slow work computer, but an old tablet is OK, because its only job is just being a comfortable web browser and video player.
I’ve just upgraded to my 3rd and the previous ones were replaced because I could not fix them. Also some freedom to change the OS would be amazing, because Android vendors max upgrades only to 4 years. That’s ridiculously low for a device that I am OK with doubling or triple a laptop age
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My suggestions after yesterdays event:
- Modular, repairable phone
- Modular, repairable tablet
- Modular, repairable printer
- Enclosure for (old) displays with VESA-mounts
- New expansion cards
The italic suggestions would secondary for me.
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I am still, personally, looking for a touchscreen to succeed my Surface Pro 6. A 360 hinge would be nice to have as it would be a true successor to my currently un-upgradable, device.
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Well, the two biggest asks have been answered (AMD and Framework XL). Where do we go from here?
The logical next choice is the next most popular, which I don’t have as good a read on. Just from the posts I’ve seen in my time here, a touch screen module is a good contender. Not to mention the fact that the reason that my friends who need new laptops are looking elsewhere is touch.
Phone is an ask for some people, and given that there’s a collaboration with Google now, Android is a possibility. I worry about starting R&D for another new form factor (how are modules going to work here?) before there’s even revenue from the last one.
I also saw a printer higher up the thread, but I’m not sure how it could be gimmick-ified to be modular other than opening the the ink bay to be made compatible by the community with any cartridge possible. Given the state of the printer market, it would definitely be industry-disrupting.
On the subject of accessories, a bit more mundane is the computer mouse. Could definitely be brought into line with laptops’ gimmick (make it expansion card sized and detach from a small dongle part of the card), or be scaled up to full size as just a sustainable mouse with its own modular ecosystem (scroll wheels, buttons, the sensor, an rp2040-enabled side button plate…).
More niche but high margin is the education market. If on-site tech support is able to stock screens for when a middle schooler inevitably steps on their school laptop, it’s significantly more cost efficient than comparable fleet alternatives. A lower spec, cheaper laptop, still modular but designed for cost efficiency and wholesale purchase? Again, there is the strain of a new R&D expense sheet, but with potential for even bigger payoff than the 16.
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It’s tough, I would have said an eGPU but the upgradable GPU laptop covers that… I don’t think tablets have a big enough market so phone I guess?
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Welp now that we have AMD, I’m gonna go the new category route and agree with Smartphone!
The foundation has been there for a while with Project Ara… Makes sense to go there next, phones haven’t exactly been repair friendly for a while…
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- I don’t see a framework phone happening unless they work with an established brand such as fairphone, either being their US distributor (they are only focused in Europe rn) or rebadging it for the US market.
- Side note it would be crazy if these two merged and became on big repairable tech company
- As someone has said, you made the two items everyone has been asking for. The 17 and 18-inch markets are extremely niche and only really used for gaming. For mobile os tablets, Apple has that market on lock, so that may not work either.
- What would make more sense would work your way into the mid-tier laptops, a better-priced Chromebook, an all-in-one computer, and possibly a 2-in-1 tablet computer.
- The mid-tier laptop market point is self-explanatory, and Be_Far made some good points on this above
- The current Chromebook is way too expensive for what a Chromebook should be priced at and their main demographic. Lower the price to be more competitive and to be an actual value because, at the end of the day, it’s a Chromebook.
- A repairable all-in-one computer would be great (unrealistic but would still be cool to see). The most “upgradable” version, I think, is the HP all-in-one in which you can upgrade the memory and storage.
- Finally, a digital artist-focused 2-in-1 laptop. Something to rival the surface pro and xps 13 2-in-1 tablet.
- Other than this, I don’t know what else can be made for your main product lineup. Maybe a high-refresh screen for people who want it, especially with the AMD and 16" variants.
This is a pipe dream I can fully get behind. Framework has branched out in the past for extra reputation and revenue—see the Steam Deck 2TB M.2 in the marketplace—I don’t think it’s too unrealistic that they become a US distributor and warehouse for Fairphone in the future, but a merger is probably out of the question.
The Chromebook pricing is why I still mentioned a fleet laptop. This Chromebook feels like more of a show of good faith to their new partner Google, who now can transition staff to bleeding-edge portable thin clients for in-house development. You would never give it to a middle schooler.
I would be excited to see a 2-in-1 or graphics tablet PC in general, especially if it came with touch innovation for the 13 or the Gamework (I’m surely not going to be the only one that calls it that…).
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Potentially you can use your Framework 1 as a NAS?
You can just plug in everything via USB/Thunderbolt. Or you can plug in a PCIe switch to the m.2, split it into boot drive and RAID/SATA controller. Or split it into more drives.
That’s sort of the issue with allocating all the lanes to Thunderbolts. I’d rather see half of the ports getting TB and the rest go to PCIe stuff like more drives and whatsnot.
Although Framework 16 seems to able to pull it off (a few ports get 2x instead of 4x). Which in my mind is perfectly fine. 8x on the expansion dock thing is nice.
I would like a good second/third screen. Especially with the 16" being released this would be a good market to go into since that’s a need for a lot of engineers and other professionals. I bought two mobile pixel screens and they’re pretty good but pricy and I would love if they followed the same design philosophy as framework. Currently the only other competitors to mobile pixels I’ve seen are Chinese brands whose quality I don’t trust.
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There are a lot of really good portable displays these days. They got a lot better the last couple years and are imo at this point a solved issue. It’s not just laptop panels in a metal box anymore, though those were allready pretty neat.
You can get an amazing looking 14" 4k oled usb-c monitor for like 2-300 bucks or a nice 1440p ips for a bit over 100 from china.
Don’t think we need framework to slap a generic controller board to a laptop panel and put it in a nice case.