Any guesses?
The bezel could be aluminium (with small rubber adhesive pads to prevent scratching on the input cover when closed), right? That way, in order to fit different aspect ratio panels, it would just be a different CNC path…no? (as opposed to a different mold)
Plastic is much less likely to harm the actual panel and mounting a aluminium bezel is a bit more work as it can’t bend as much as well as embedding the magnets if not going for a screwmount.
“mounting” the input cover using magnets hasn’t been an issue though.
If you have felt backing on the aluminium bezel, that wouldn’t harm the panel (in my head). Or are you thinking of “while” assembling in a DIY scenario (butter fingers)?
My guess would be durability/flexibility. The bezel is quite thin. When installing and uninstalling the bezel, an aluminum one would be very easy to bend/deform. If it was aluminum, it would just stay that way. If that happened, it would end up all janky and be very difficult to make it sit properly against the top cover/display.
The bezel is also the pad/buffer between the top cover and the input cover. If it was aluminum it would still have to have some kind of plastic or rubber to act as a soft surface against the bottom.
I could be wrong, but I feel like it would be a less durable (or at least, easier to permanently mess up), and more complicated part to make. I know the plastic can crack/break too, but I think it would be a lot more common to tweak an aluminum one than to break the plastic one.
As aspect of design; structural rigidity. i.e. The same argument applies to the input cover. You design for it to be lifted…and stay flat.
That feet / pad can be applied to either the top side of the input cover, or the bottom facing side of the bezel.
Even with plastic bezel, you see rubber feet / strips fitted to them with other laptops.
True, but the input cover screws down, it isn’t just magnets. Also, it’s FAR thicker, with lots more metal than the bezel would have. There are almost multiple layers, with a keyboard an touchpad screwed to the back of it, making it an almost “laminated” structure. And even then, it’s pretty flexible. The bezel is far thinner and would bend way more easily.
Adding rubber pads and felt backing increases the manufacturing steps and BOM.
Obviously, just speculating.
I’m not so sure if you take the thickness of the bezel that’s not externally visible into consideration (the portion that contains magnets and goes into the lid).
Even the ‘lip’ of the bezel is thicker than the ‘lip’ of the input cover…
Yes, agree, steps and BOM…bill to the customers. The laptop isn’t price competitive as it is, one would argue, but I guess every dollar counts.
Reason why I’m thinking about this is because it ‘seems’ (and I could be totally wrong) like the injection molding direction of the bezel has backed us into a bit of a corner with panel choices (maybe?).
There’s also, historically, been a question on lid rigidity…an area that has room for improvement.
The back side of the bezel is also quite complex. Lots of little tabs and bumps and such. Plus cutouts for the camera, mics, switches, sensors, etc. It makes for a complicated mold, sure. But once you have the mold, you just crank out the parts. It would be much more complicated to make it out of aluminum. If they had to CNC it, there would be a lot of steps. It would be a pricey part to make. Sure, changing a couple of those steps could allow them to make rounded inside corners instead of square, but that would still leave them with multiple skus to make and stock moving forward.
The width of the edges of the bezel are maybe 3/16" to 1/4" at most. In terms of thickness, it’s probably 1/16" in places, not counting the little lip. Even counting that lip, it’s probably less than 1/8". And if it was aluminum, that lip likely wouldn’t be there, because that’s thickness the rubber pads would take up to act as padding between the bezel and input cover.
Yes, the input cover is quite thin at the edges, but it’s thicker just a bit in from there, plus, there’s less leverage against that. The bezel is a (roughly) 8x11" frame that is very thin on the sides. I think it would bend and kink really easily.
Also, the FW16 has a cutout in the top of the cover for the antennas, but the antennas on the FW13 are behind the plastic bezel. If it was aluminum, it would block the signals and they’d need another spot for the signals to get out.
Again, I could be wrong. Those are just my guesses as to why. I have no experience with manufacturing and my guesses as to the difficulty or cost issues are just that: Guesses. I’ve dealt with thin aluminum and know how flimsy it can be. But heat treated/tempered aluminum alloys can be fairly strong, so who knows. Again, it’s just my gut that aluminum that thin with that much leverage potential from the length of the sides would be too easy to bend. But who knows.
Aluminum that is too thin will deform and WiFi signals will be blocked.
Plastic makes sense to me too and indeed it covers the antenna and allows the wireless signal to penetrate through.
Not only that but it allows them to do the bezel in different colours, which if done in aluminium would require anodizing, which is against the non-pollution aims of Framework due to the chemicals involved in the anodizing process.
LoL…wifi signal. Phones PDAs (e.g. Sony Clie, such as the T615c) solved that years decades ago. It’s part of the engineering.
Colours…dbrand…skins, wraps.
Keywords. You design for it. Just like you don’t design key caps to be paper thin.
Every dimension is a outcome of engineering / design (intentional is preferred. Unintentional, good luck).
Are these products replaceable?
For example, when designing the iPhone, the outer frame is used as an antenna. Maybe the Framework can also be designed in this direction, but there will be one more connecting wire.
Not everyone treats things with care, and don’t forget that there are always careless users.
Yes, every product is replaceable… (i.e. You can always buy new ones)