[Discuss] Framework 13 keyb(Was Linux backups)

[gaf.linux at gmail.com (Jerry Feldman)]

While not dedicated, home, end, page up and down use the FN key.

--
Jerry Feldman <gaf.linux at gmail.com>
Boston Linux and Unix http://www.blu.org

On Sat, Dec 14, 2024, 5:15?PM Kent Borg <kentborg at borg.org> wrote:

> On 12/13/24 12:07 PM, Jerry Feldman wrote:
> > I am in the process of moving my home directory to a new laptop >
> (framework) and retiring my tower.
> It has been a few months since I got my Framework 13, an AMD Ryzen
> model, thought people might be interested in how it is going.
>
> Spoiler: I like it, I am glad I chose it, but it is very much not perfect.
>
> The over all approach of being so modular is good. I could afford far
> more RAM than I could otherwise, I have already had occasion to swap
> SSDs.  At some point I'll get a bigger SSD. For the four expansion ports
> I bought four USB-C modules, and am using them most, but I also have a
> USB-A and a micro SD module, they are occasionally nice to have.
>
> I expect there will be multi-function expansion modules in the future,
> say, two USB-C jacks.
>
> The four USB-C expansion holes are picky, they don't all do everything,
> some cables that used to work on my old XPS-13 don't on this, the power
> supply that used to work on my XPS-13 doesn't quite work on this.
> Though, as I check now, all four *do* seem to work for power. Maybe
> Trixie has some advantages after all.
>
> And old Asus portable monitor, that is a single USB-C for power and
> video, only works on two of the four ports. I haven't tried a
> self-powered monitor, yet. Sounds like my problems with the expansion
> ports being picky is not just my unit, others report similar problems.
> But four ports that are a bit picky is still better than just one or two
> ports.
>
> I feared being easy to open would make it more fragile than other
> laptops, but it seems quite sturdy.
>
> I have run stable Debian 12, and am now on testing for Debian 13. The
> SSD I bought (same model as they sell, but not from Framework) had a
> defect that makes waking from sleep take an extra half-minute. Replacing
> it was the fix, but I also moved to Debian testing (Trixie) as part of
> figuring it out. Trixie seems so far a lot like 12 (Bookworm) though at
> some point waking from hibernation broke. I haven't tracked it down
> because with sleep working, the need isn't so great. And who knows, they
> might have already fixed it and I don't know yet.
>
> Power consumption when I am not doing much seems too high, maybe this
> will improve by the time I might have occasion to need lots of battery
> life.
>
> The lack of dedicated page up, down, home, and end keys is annoying.
> This isn't the fault of Framework specifically, it seems to be an
> industry-wide conspiracy. I hate needing two hands to just scroll
> through things. My workaround is some key remapping software to make
> caps lock be a sticky way to turn the arrow keys into their secondary
> functions. Not perfect when I forget I have it on, and don't notice the
> LED, things will be funny until I hit the caps lock again.
>
> Debian defaults to turning the 2256x1504 display into I think a 1128x752
> display, which is silly, but running it at 1-to-1, which I am doing, is
> a bit hard on the eyes, too. At some point I'll probably switch to
> 1920x1200.
>
> I have a problem with the trackpad sticking, there is a adjustment that
> is reportedly pretty easy, but I haven't gotten around to it.
>
> As with more than one of my previous laptops, there is an annoying
> problem of it not staying asleep when I put it to sleep. I'm told this
> is because ACPI is a godawful mess. The setting to sleep when the lid is
> closed seems to only respond to the *event* of the lid closing and pays
> no attention to the *state* of the lid being shut. And when it is shut,
> there apparently are things that will wake the computer, and then it
> stays awake, burning down the battery, getting hot. My solution was to
> write a little Rust program, sleep-dammit, that looks at the lid state.
> If it is closed it tells the computer to sleep. The program then does a
> thread sleep for a few seconds??to avoid any cases of bugs in my code
> and aggressive narcolepsy being impossible to interrupt. Mostly I do not
> want to sleep when the lid is closed, but before I fly on a plane I open
> a new terminal and run sleep-dammit there.
>
> This Framework 13 is a noticeably bigger and heavier than my previous
> XPS-13 (a several year old model, the last good one they made, I say).
> About the same width, a tad thicker, but mostly a lot deeper (that is,
> taller screen when open). I think I would like it smaller, but at least
> I am not forced to buy a big 16-inch-ish monster. The Framework 13 is
> kind of usable in a cheap airplane seat.
>
> They keys are farther apart than they were on my XPS-13. It is the
> XPS-13 that was non-standard, but my fingers still needed to adjust.
>
> When I had a recent Mac from work I found the front edge, under my
> palms, to be annoyingly sharp. (They expect everyone to have an external
> keyboard for most use?) The Framework 13 made a similar design decision,
> but with a somewhat larger corner radius, and not annoying.
>
> I am running MATE desktop (if that matters), and some battery software
> likes to report that the power is disconnected, when it isn't, the pilot
> light indicating it is plugged in and charged is lit. Oh, and the
> reported expected battery life is tree or four digits worth of hours. It
> did this on Debian stable, too. Mildly annoying, as the notification
> interrupts me and takes up screen space.
>
> There are hard switches for the camera and mic, which is good. But
> oddly, they each show red when the camera or mic is shut off, when I
> think of being "on" as more dangerous and worthy of red, they seem to
> think "off" is what should be red. Bad UI to be so ambiguous.
>
>
> A nice machine, and one that I expect will get better with age.
>
>
> -kb
> _______________________________________________
> Discuss mailing list
> Discuss at lists.blu.org
> https://lists.blu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>