ExpansionCards

In past lives, I've clung to 3.5mm jacks and battery swaps (although I consider myself much reformed, yes I maybe would buy an updated LG v20 if one were released: that was an amazingly built metal slate of a phone with both. Just hot and slow, on that Snapdragon 820). Today, bluetooth works quite well for me (I love not having cables... but it sucks that performance with a microphone is trashfire). 3.5mm adapters are cheap and easy when needed (rarely. I also have a $10 bluetooth->3.5mm in my travel kit that does get used once a year!). And with usb-c providing fast charging, I rarely feel like I'd benefit from battery swaps. I can give myself 50%+ in 30 minutes, with a portable battery that will power not just my phone, but any other device I run into. With Qi 2.2 releasing with 25W wireless charging, and magnetic coupling being standar

They will probably never make a LoRa module, but making a LoRa expansion card would be a pretty interesting project. You can get more info about the expansion cards on the dedicated github repo: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards

I think the SD module won't be able to have the card flush. SD cards are 32mm long, and you need some PCB space for the socket cage and the USB-C on the other side. The retrofit PCB outline they provide is only 26.9mm from front edge to back edge, so an SD card will stick out a little bit. So perhaps they decided to first go for the one that lets users have the card flush for use like an expansion bay as well as for data transfer to/from devices. https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards/tree/mai...

Framework is doing brilliant work. They create reusable computer formats that anyone can hack against. Strongly considering a Framework 13 as my next computer. - Expansion cards: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards - Expansion bay: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionBay - Input modules: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/inputmodule-rs

The designs are available on GitHub under Creative Commons licensing: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards We've seen both community developed Expansion Cards and other device makers starting to adopt Expansion Cards.

Yep, we absolutely understand and respect Louis and community members' requests for full schematics, and we appreciate the folks who extend understanding as we work through constraints (including Louis as noted in that last video). We're continuing to make as much open as we can, and we're adding to that list as we go: * Mainboard partial schematics, drawings, and pinouts: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/Mainboard * Expansion Card reference designs: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards * Embedded Controller firmware: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/EmbeddedController On the list of things that we are exploring ways to improve on in the future: * More of the schematics, including of modules beyond the Mainboards. * Moving to open UEFI/BIOS solutions.

They publish the CAD files (both mechanical and electrical) on GitHub with instructions on how to manufacture your own expansion cards. I believe the interface within the expansion cards is just standard USB-C. If someone could manage to squeeze all the necessary components within the physical dimensions, it should be possible to make your own soundcard expansion card. https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards

A USB-C slot with publicly-available and open-source CAD and specs on GitHub (https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards) is basically the least proprietary format ever created.

Yep, but without the proprietary part. We have released reference designs under Creative Commons: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards

> That was possible on nearly all laptops some years back. Not necessarily in this size class/with this chassis design. "Ultrabooks" as a class haven't been nearly as user-serviceable as you're suggesting. > made by a single company, few variants; Bays might be the most proprietary Eh. I'm not terribly worried about this given that they're TB3 or TB4 (to wit: PCIe) and provided with reference designs[1]. I have to admit, though, that I couldn't easily find IBM's old expansion bay spec or proprietary connector... or for that matter, HP's, or Dell's, or... well, yes. Bays sure are proprietary. To extoll the virtues of somebody else's bays and in the same breath deny these is at best misplaced nostalgia. :) [1]: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards

They're not proprietary. They're just USB-C, and if you mean the overall shape of them, then they're still not: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards is available under CC-BY.

This has come up before (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28607793). The usual response I see from Framework owners is it turns out having recessed dongles is actually a surprisingly nice convenience that beats out normal dongles way more than you'd think. But RE the dongles locking people in, you can literally just replace it with an actual normal dongle if you'd like, but also the schematics are completely open (https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards). This is very very different from the way Apple does things.

Framework's hardware is entirely open source (https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards) so you can buy parts from any third-party that wants to produce them.

Even if Framework goes out of business, most crucial parts that are likely to fail are standard (hard drive, memory, battery), so you'd still be able to replace them yourself. And even for the ones that aren't (like the modular ports), the schematics are available [1], so anyone would be able to make new ones. [1]: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards

> If Framework opens this up for other companies to make modules From what I can tell, they already did that: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards > USB port module with an integrated Logitech wireless mouse receiver This guy seems to be making something like that (minus the USB port): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_uOzNt-xwY People are working on some interesting stuff. Example: RP2040 expansion card: https://community.frame.work/t/rp2040-microcontroller-expans... The engineers at framework seem to be very active on the forum engaging with the community.