I’m about to order my first Framework and regarding the price and battery usage, I think I’d go with the 11th gen CPU edition. What I would like to know now is if this version also comes with the new top cover and the new hinges, or if the old CPU generation also comes with the old parts.
I would appreciate it if I could get a definitive answer from the @Framework team.
BTW: I’ll order from Germany, if that makes any difference.
The answer lies within the announcement blog post for those products. All FW laptops come with the old hinges, they are available only as an upgrade purchase, only 12th gen and newer come with the CNC top cover. It is also available for purchase in the marketplace
Quick note @Cleber and @x3ro, when you tag @ Framework, you ping every single employee in the company. If you mean to tag just customer service, tag @ Twistgibber or @ BeeAPeach (I only included spaces there so I didn’t actually ping people).
Another note, this is a user forum, so while Framework employees do respond sometimes, the best and most efficient way to get an official response like that is to contact support.
I also assume that the 11th gen version has already been built with the old cover and that they are just selling the remaining stock but I can also imagine that they changed the cover at some point (maybe they had more mainboards than cases and are now selling the old mainboard with newer cases). But I wasn’t able to find a definitive answer to that question.
Since the new top cover seems to have a slightly higher weight (25g according to this review), I expected the 12th gen version to be that much heavier if the 11th gen would not have the new top cover, but it turns out that the 12th generation is almost 700g hevier (1.3 kg for the 11th gen vs 4.40 lbs (~ 2 kg) for the 12th gen) so that was a dead end.
Hinge:
I have not got an official answer regarding the top cover but @amoun already quoted an official answer regarding the hinge:
The 4.0kg hinge is not meant as an upgrade but targets users that have to use the laptop in “bumpy” environments like a car or a bus. The 3.3 kg hinge is designed to make it possible to open the laptop with one hand (that is without holding down the bottom part while folding it open) but if the laptop is moved heavily while it is open, the hinges might not be strong enough to hold it in place and thus, the display might “fall down” (it opens up wider).
There was also a time when the 3.3 kg hinge was manufactured poorly and did not actually hold 3.3 kg so displays did fall down even when standing still. But this issue has since been resolved and even the 11th gen comes with a hinge that does not fall down now.
Since I posted my question I have decided to buy the 12th gen version anyways so I still don’t know the answer to the top cover question, so @dragan feel free to contact support if you are still interested in the answer. If you post a definite answer from the support team, I’ll mark it as the solution.
You are right there is a mistake on the 12th gen DIY page. The non-DIY page shows 1.3 kg also in Germany. I also just weight my 12th gen and it is slightly above 1.3 kg (I didn’t remove the RAM and SSD so a slightly higher weight is expected).
Nevertheless, I think that they rounded to 100 g or so on the product page, so I guess 25 g won’t show up there.