I see the huge appeal for Framework laptops and kudos for them to make themselves a niche in this tough market.
I stick to used Thinkpads for now though but if Framework (or any other) makes them reasonable upgradable (5-8 screws are fine) a bit waterproof, open BIOS and the Pointing stick, I'll pay dearly for it! And I am sure I am not alone. Tuxedo, Slimbook, come on... make a bold move here!!
if by the time i can afford them used they are still doing well, i would totally take it instead of a thinkpad
I just replaced my laptop. I had an old Lenovo Yoga Flex 5. The keyboard on it died. I looked up the part. It was $100. Honestly not worth the cost for a 5 year old laptop that has other problems anyway. Frameworks are crazy expensive. I picked up a very high quality (much higher quality than Framework, based on what I've read) and powerful 1 year old Lenovo Yoga Pro 7 instead for <$300. So, it's going to be hard for me to ever justify the cost of one of these things. It really only makes sense, to me, if you need the most powerful machines available every year.
It is, don't feel bad.
Honestly I've been hovering over the buy button for like two years now. The only thing stopping me is the lack of my beloved nipple mouse.
There's been this effort, but it has stalled. There are others which have also hit a roadblock (basically, the keyboard is too thin to fit a proper trackpoint, and there's no space below it for the module to go). It sucks but I'm not losing hope for now.
I get it, but we are a dying breed Balsoft. The trackpoint requires no hand movement so very efficient but for newcomers they just desist when you put that pressure into your index finger that at first, it may be even be painful; therefore they just give it up at first 5min. Also, I remember when HP made laptops with the nipple (blue and tad larger) and I was not that appealed for it (and probably everyone else) so they stop it making it. There is something else in the ThinkPad red nipple, maybe the symbology of an era. Just for that, I will probably die old in top of a Thinkpad. Now, like i mentioned, if some laptop bold company brings something truly unique, differentiated and practical... I will jump ship.
I found the cupped "soft rim" cap much more comfortable than the standard domed cap.
Eh honestly frameworks are unique, differentiated and practical. I just can't live without a trackpoint.I don't use the pointer much anyways, so the convenience of just having it right there on the home row for cases when I do is irresistible. I love it so much that my desktop doesn't have a separate mouse, just a TEX Shinobi keyboard (which has a trackpoint). My main laptop, X201s with cool chinese CPU upgrade also doesn't have any pointer input other than a trackpoint. I think you can see why I am hesitating to switch to a device without one, even if the repairability, future mobo upgrades, and "internal dongles" are very appealing.
And as for the dying breed, I don't think that's necessarily the case. There are a lot of questions & requests about it on Framework forums, r/framework and such. It's just that it would require a serious chassis redesign which is insanely expensive.
So cool.
I wound verbally diss it for even thinking of trying to help me in this trivial matter tho. Like, why do you think you are so smart, you're not even fully assembled (and why does it need a keyboard even?).
Right? Like, if you're so smart then finish assembling yourself!
The mode only seems to trigger if the midplate is pressing a switch on the MB. If you are running the MB without the midplate it doesn’t seem to trigger, so the server car should be supported.
That is unbelievably cool.
So far so good, but I hope it can be disabled so that it doesn't get in your way if you want to build a server out of an old laptop or so