Framework is the company you’d shill your money to, if you care about laptop parts availability, tutorials on how to replace stuff should it break, and, overall, to have a sustainable laptop.

Sustainable as in: you have to sustain it with an enormous flow of money should something ever die on you.

The experience

So, I’ve had this Framework laptop (the Laptop 13) for a good year now - more of, like, a year and four months. It’s been reliable, I’ll give it that, however, the laptop is unusably slow when used on battery. Now I know what you’re saying: “Nao, dear Lord, everyone knows that laptops perform at their best when they’re connected to the charger” however I would expect some kind of fluidity from a laptop even when it’s not charging, especially if said fluidity is required to just manage some very basic windows, like a browser and a file manager, 90% of the times.

I’ve mostly used this laptop while sitting; meaning I did use this laptop on a desk for most of its lifespan; I am saying this now because it will become relevant later. Oh, and, I have always carried the laptop while powered off - no suspend, no idle, always powered off.

The problems start

I’ve been bedridden lately, mostly due to my body not ever knowing the notion of “feeling well” since I was, what, age 12? Anyway, this of course means I had to use my laptop to get most stuff done, and I had to use it while in my bed, so that it’s placed on my lap most of the time. This, of course, means that the laptop will ever so subtly be shaked and tilted, or, if I have to go somewhere, the laptop will be grabbed while powered on and put on another surface, such as the bed itself.

So, at the end of September, I grab my laptop and move it to the side, and it reboots on me. I didn’t panic, I mean, I know that laptops are the work of chaotic wizardry, and that even pure luck (or lack thereof) can influence the operation of such delicate and reality-bending machines.

The days following nothing particular occurs, except that in one occasion I brought the laptop from my bedroom to the kitchen because I had some stuff to do and also I needed to cook in that same moment. The portability of portable laptops is sure one wonderful thing to have, right? Except. It. Rebooted. Again.

And when I left the kitchen to sit on my couch in my living room, and I brought the laptop with me again… wouldn’t you guess it? It rebooted. And this time it was from sleep mode. It rebooted as soon as I opened its lid.

Contacting Framework Support

I contacted Framework Support since I am an European Citizen and their limited warranty lasts two whole years in the EU (and three in other countries - god I’d love for my country to make a law that requires companies to offer a warranty for three years or more…)

They told me that the issue could be related to components seating, so they instructed me to take apart the whole laptop and put it back again. Well, those laptops are designed to be taken apart, so I mean it should be easy, right?

It is right quite indeed, and with all the carefulness in the world I take apart the laptop piece by piece, following Framework’s repair guides, until the mainboard comes out. While disassembling the laptop, I see that the battery connector is plugged slightly sideways; whatever, I say, it comes from assembly and the laptop turns on, so I shouldn’t question it much. When done, I do take appropriate photos of the underside of the mainboard since it could very well be shot, and I prepare myself to reassemble the thing. Thing is, see this part of the Framework Guide? I carefully inspect my own mainboard to find why the connector was plugged in slightly sideways: the rightmost pin on the motherboard side was bent to hell.

There are other oddities I noticed, such as the fact that one screw on the mainboard just came out when I hovered on it with my magnetic screwdriver, which is not what a screw should do, and that same screw, when put back, spinned freely without ever catching on any threads. Wonderful!

This is a QA nightmare, or the guy (or robot) who (or which) assembled my laptop was so much in a hate for the customer who purchased it they’d think pulling two seemingly innocent stunts would be much fun. Whatever it is, now I know my laptop has some conformity defects; the problem? I happen to know it only one year later.

Going forwards

Now, Support wants me to send this laptop in for repair, but I am certain that all those conformity defects will be referred to as customer identifiable damages, because the audience for such a laptop usually takes it apart to meddle with it (but I did not) and now I will probably be forced to spend some money to get it fixed or spend more money to sue Framework Laptop just to prove one way or the other that indeed I did not mess with that battery connector.

Update (October 21 2025): Support told me that they “will be proceeding with the repair center review under warranty as a one time exception.” One time exception? What? You mean that if your customer isn’t tech savvy enough to fix their issue or diagnose it themselves you… void their warranty? You refuse? What. The. Fuck.

Ah, for context, I refused to bend the connector pin back, because I am disabled, my hands shake too much, and I cannot do that job without breaking even more pins.

We will see how this ends up and I will revise this section of the blogpost later.

Is it really repairable?

I will take it from an average customer’s perspective because I know that there are some nerds with microsoldering skills out there - this rant is not for you.

If you bought a Framework product because you expected the repair shop next door to have an easier time tracking down components down to the single chip or connector used, well, you’d have a point. It all falls when we remember that most tech repair shops don’t ever do board-level repairs, and that at most they swap a faulty part for a new one, and in this case, as is with tons of laptops in the market, it’d be the mainboard. And, as is the case for most laptops out there, the replacement mainboard costs money.

Framework currently sells my exact same mainboard at a discount, only €569. I spent €1453 on this laptop when I initially ordered it, so 39% of the initial laptop cost doesn’t seem bad at all - except it is, because the laptop’s worth degrades over time as a whole, and so the laptop isn’t even valued its initial price by today’s standards. The funny thing? I cannot even make a laptop with my exact configuration in Framework’s website because they don’t even sell it anymore! (But if they did, it’d cost people less than 1000 bucks from my findings.)

Then there’s the elephant in the room: NDAs. Let’s say that my local repair shop can do and is willing to do board-level repair on my mainboard… where do they find the schematics? Not that in such a simple case schematics are needed really, it’s just a connector swap, but hypothetically they’d need the schematics should a more serious issue ever come to light. Well, Framework does provide them with schematics, but under NDA. That is, the whole premise of having a user-repairable laptop falls short because we, as customers, cannot have access to the schematics to source components ourselves and swap them in and out with our soldering irons.

We are only supposed to buy the shiny new part (or the old stock) that Framework sells us, and to replace the old part with such shiny new part which costs us way more than the effective damage is worth.

A rant on the battery connector specifically

We know that batteries all wear and eventually they become spicy pillows; this means that even if I get my laptop fixed by support, they won’t replace my battery yet because it’s deemed “still good for their standards”. Then time will come that I need to purchase a new battery and swap it out, but with such unreliable and very fragile connector, how many chances do I get at doing it right?

Put your tinfoil hat on, for one second, and hear me out: Framework knows that the battery connector is fragile, but they didn’t replace it yet because it makes them sell more mainboards, often in pair with batteries. Since a laptop upgrade is most often a new mainboard with a new battery, they are effectively “selling a brand new laptop” everytime. And since they can effectively price a new mainboard at 1k shills and beyond, this means this whole “right to repair” facade is absolutely turning them more profit than if they were anti-repair to begin with.

Framework is not any better than other competing companies, truly

They’ve built this entire empire on the premise of right to repair, and some of the most influential tech presences have recommended them for years now. However, all that’s required to make the illusion go away is a simple discovery, a conformity defect, to make all of it worth nothing.

And the worst part? Framework laptops are still rare, we can’t even reach the point where the used market is flooded with broken laptops listed “for parts” to buy to make one working thing off of two broken ones.

Conclusions

Do you have a Framework device? How’s your story with it up until now?

Do leave me some comments down below if you can, because I am furious. Oh, and I’ve stressed myself enough to go nonverbal on this one. Nice!

Addendum (October 21 2025): I saw that this post blew up on some circles, and people complimented me on the writeup. I don’t know what to say because this is just my experience with Framework and I didn’t really cite anything. If I wanted to do better, I could’ve, so uh…

Well, I will cite some more stuff here:

• Battery Connector advice, from Framework;
• My own post in Framework Community;
• This is most probably my issue and, therefore, it happened to someone else as well;
• This post here is hinting at new mainboards having bent pins already:

  “putting in the new [mainboard] […] took only 20 minutes however, as I was about to insert the battery, I noticed a bent battery pin. It was a pain but I managed to bend it back and insert the battery connector.”

• A Reddit post of someone who got a new mainboard with a bent battery pin.

With much affection,
Your Dear Nao