Will the old motherboard work in Framework 16?

[Adrian_Joachim]

@Name2

And my point is that, with a bit of planning, you could have created a 13" motherboard with the possibility to attach a small extra board to have the extra capabilities of the 16", so the motherboards, the most expensive part, are interchangeable. This would also make the production chain simpler.

You seem to be underestimating the differences there, the stuff on the 16 isn’t stuff you can just “stick on”.

You need a whole different power management system because of the expansion bay, you need a mux for the internal display for the expansion bay, you need 8pcie lanes,whatever is needed for the 2 extra expansion cards, 2 more sodimm slots and probably a lot more things that I didn’t think about right now.

It is probably possible to do a board that does both but it would just end up sucking at both.

[Frankie_Wild]

@Adrian_Joachim

You seem to be underestimating the differences there, the stuff on the 16 isn’t stuff you can just “stick on”.

I agree we are talking about two different functional categories - workstations and ultraportables and to make things harder workstations nowadays are also aiming for thin and light which makes it a nightmare for modularity. Older workstations were fully modular including expansion bays, cpu sockets, chipsets etc but they didn’t have any space and weight constraints at the time.

[Andre_Z]

One of the reasons I was initially asking was because I was debating ordering a 13 inch with the idea that I would upgrade to a 16 inch, using the 13 inch motherboard, later on.

But as it stands now I will wait and get the 16 inch.

[Frankie_Wild]

@Andre_Z

One of the reasons I was initially asking was because I was debating ordering a 13 inch with the idea that I would upgrade to a 16 inch, using the 13 inch motherboard, later on.

I doubt it will ever be possible to upgrade between classes from an ultraportable to a workstation. That’s beyond modularity.

[Andre_Z]

Yes, I realized that which is why I am fine with waiting.

I was just at the point of wanting to support Framework, needing to buy a new laptop, but at the same time wanting to utilize the features the 16 inch offers.