241–250 of 378 posts
I’m happy to answer questions that folks have on this. There was also an earlier HN thread on our full launch event where we announced 13th Gen Intel Core and AMD Ryzen 7040 Series versions of the Framework Laptop 13, along with a bunch of other stuff: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35277660
... however, every time I've put my faith in "this technology is modular and you will be able to extend/upgrade it way into the future", I've been disappointed. The worst offenders are CPU manufacturers who assure us that "Socket N" will be their new CPU pin format for, well, a good long time, and then two years later we move to "Socket N+1". The same thing for RAM. My experience that expecting an upgrade path via physical interface re-use with new components buys you at most 3 years, sometimes only 2.
Framework appear to building the actual components into their self-design modules, so that they control the physical interfaces. This seems like a step up but if the company remains small then the chance of not being able to upgrade again in a few years because they're either out of business, or are not packaging the components you want, seem fairly high. The fact that the designs are going to be open sourced is great, but I don't see that as a strong hedge against this problem.
I wonder if there is a market for a framework gaming laptop. Really hope there is. Also, on another note, I've read this engadget article about how other companies tried to build an upgradeable laptop and failed but I see Framework as a different kind of beast for one simple reason. This is their only value proposition, they don't have an alternative. In a very "Innovator's Dilemma" kind of. way, Dell and other big m…
It's a pity the keyboard design never seriously improves even for the niche laptops. Like, the space to the sides is useless here, but if you could split the keyboard and move that space to to the middle - well, know you've moved one step closer towards more ergonomic typing! Or better yet, you could move all those pinky keys there so that instead of moving your right pinky to hit backspace you'd just move your right…
A lot of laptops need to reserve the space to the side of the keyboards, for their ports - in fact, whenever you see a laptop where the keyboard is kissing the edge of the laptop, it usually has a dire shortage of ports (typically 1 USB port, a charger, a headphone jack, and nothing else). This makes sense if you realize that it's a choice between keyboard girth and thin-ness; you can either have the keyboard on top…
I mean, even with the same width, moving backspace between halves has no impact on the ports, where is that useful innovation for the few of us that make typos?
Or replacing the spacebar with a few thumb keys - that is also port-effect-free
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Because it's easier to touch empty space and adjust fingers. Back when I worked on Thinkpad, I really hated these keys, whenever I accidentally pressed them. I don't say you're wrong, just it's a matter of taste. It's the same with mechanical keyboards - I can't use these compact 75% keyboards where arrows/Pg Up/Pg Down/Home/End are flush with other keys; but a bit "exploded" layout, with just a bit of space between…
Absolutely agree. I have those keys remapped to an additional left and right arrow on my T480 because I was constantly pressing them while navigating on the command line and it would erase my entire command.
I cannot possibly convey how much I hate this setup, I find it very uncomfortable. And even though there is a separate row of Home-PgUp-PgDn-End to the right, I can never find the correct key.
Compared to this, the Thinkpad's six-block cursor setup is vastly superior in my opinion. The down arrow has a notch, so it is easy to find as an origo, and the cursor keys are lower / slanted slightly compared to PgUp/PgDn, so it is virtually impossible to not know which is which! This is on a Thinkpad X1C.
All this goes to show that everyone has different preferences, so good luck if you are a laptop maker - you will inevitably make someone very unhappy with your keyboard. Possible solution - replaceable keyboard?...
I'm probably going to need a new laptop this year. My needs are simple: large screen, numpad and enough raw compute power to be usable for the primary task my computers face: compiling a large-ish native C++ application. This machine looks like an excellent candidate and I love the modular concept ... ... however, every time I've put my faith in "this technology is modular and you will be able to extend/upgrade it wa…
CPU upgradability was never a real selling point except for ONE use case - when. new socket came out, buy the cheapest reasonable CPU early on, and then just when it was about to cease manufacturing, buy the best you could get; would give you a year or two extra.
RAM and disk upgrades USED to be very important; but I haven't really "felt" the need anymore.
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You're wrong. It's a 16:10 screen. CEO: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35280523
Ugh. After over a decade of work, everything was finally adapted to or made for 16:9, now they're going after hipster ratios? Not a deal breaker but a bummer. Interesting that phones are going the other way, so now we can enjoy letterboxes on both platforms and not be able to reach the notification drawer. What was so wrong with 16:9 that we needed another competing standard that's just slightly off...
I think it's pretty great because it means less scrolling. I would really prefer to see 4:3 again.
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There's a trope in car nerd circles of "We all know the best vehicle is a manual transmission brown diesel station wagon" and then of course these people only buy one that's 10 years old, so at this point no car company makes such a beast new . Pre-covid I'd made do with whatever garbage keyboard and garbage monitor $job dumped in front of me, but almost by happenstance I ended up with a 16:10 monitor and an IBM M4-1…
Apparently the reason nobody makes station wagons new (for the US market) is because the US has a tax on cars and there is a loophole that allows SUVs and pickup trucks to avoids it as they are classified as "light trucks". There are plenty of station wagons made for the european market (although we call them estate cars on this side of the pond).
I think station wagons just mostly went out of style. I think it's dumb but the American public has always gravitated towards physically bigger and bigger cars, to the point where it's considered totally normal to commute to an office job in a 12 mpg super duty pickup with extended crew cab and duallies in the back.
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Ugh. After over a decade of work, everything was finally adapted to or made for 16:9, now they're going after hipster ratios? Not a deal breaker but a bummer. Interesting that phones are going the other way, so now we can enjoy letterboxes on both platforms and not be able to reach the notification drawer. What was so wrong with 16:9 that we needed another competing standard that's just slightly off...
What 16:9 is good for? It is inconvenient for any work: for coding, reading articles or working with documents more height is better. Please explain for what kind of activity wide, but low height screen is the most suitable? The only thing that comes to mind is killing time by watching videos on social networks sites.
Is it? Gee, I wonder why it's the only screen ratio I've seen people use since we moved away from CRT screens until a few years ago when 4k and friends became popular and there was suddenly no standard resolution to expect anymore. Curious that we're all using this inferior ratio for literally all those things all the time.
I'm probably going to need a new laptop this year. My needs are simple: large screen, numpad and enough raw compute power to be usable for the primary task my computers face: compiling a large-ish native C++ application. This machine looks like an excellent candidate and I love the modular concept ... ... however, every time I've put my faith in "this technology is modular and you will be able to extend/upgrade it wa…
Most of the "modularity" of Framework seems to be USB dongles built-in. CPU upgradability was never a real selling point except for ONE use case - when. new socket came out, buy the cheapest reasonable CPU early on, and then just when it was about to cease manufacturing, buy the best you could get; would give you a year or two extra. RAM and disk upgrades USED to be very important; but I haven't really "felt" the nee…