Framework Laptop 13

Hardware	PCI/USB ID	Working?
GPU		Yes
Wireless		Yes
Audio (Intel)	8086:a0c8	Yes
Audio (AMD)	1002:1640	Yes
Touchpad	093a:0274	Yes
Webcam	0bda:5634	Yes
Fingerprint reader	27c6:609c	Yes
Bluetooth		Yes
Accelerometer		Untested
TPM		Yes
Ambient light sensor		Yes

This article covers the installation and configuration of Arch Linux on a Framework Laptop.

For a general overview of laptop-related articles and recommendations, see Laptop.

Hardware

Framework is intended to be a configurable and upgradeable laptop. The lists below is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all the hardware sold with the framework, but rather a list of tested components.

Note: Ensure you have linux-firmware installed, as pointed out by Installation guide#Install essential packages before reporting hardware issues on the Arch bug tracker or Framework Community boards. It is an optional dependency of linux and does not automatically get installed as part of base. Without it, much of the hardware will be detected but will not be fully functional. You will see firmware loading issues in the journal.

WiFi/Bluetooth

Device Name	PCI ID	Bluetooth USB ID	Working?	Bluetooth?	Notes
AX200	8086:2723	8087:0029	Yes	Yes	Pre-production units
AX201 vPro			Untested	Untested	Professional Edition
AX201 w/o vPro	8086:a0f0	8087:0026	Yes	Yes	Base/Performance Editions
AX210 vPro	8086:2725	8087:0032	Yes	Yes	DIY Edition (Optional)
AX210 w/o vPro	8086:2725	8087:0032	Yes	Yes	DIY Edition (Optional)
AX411 vPro	8086:51f0	8087:0033	Yes	Yes	Not sold by Framework, but works
RZ608 / MediaTek MT7921K	---	0e8d:e608	Yes	Yes	Not sold by Framework, known to work
RZ616 / MediaTek MT7922	14c3:0616	0e8d:e616	Yes	Yes	AMD edition

WiFi performance on AMD edition

You will be limited to 802.11n (WiFi 4) and 2.4GHz bands if you do not configure the regulatory domain.

There have been reports of WiFi stability and throughput improvements when using iwd, either directly or as the NetworkManager backend.

Graphics

Intel / i915

Device Name	PCI ID	Working?
TigerLake-LP GT2 [Iris Xe Graphics]	8086:9a49	Yes
Alder Lake-P Integrated Graphics Controller	8086:46a6	Yes

AMD / amdgpu

Device Name	PCI ID	Working?	Notes
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Phoenix1	1002:15bf	Yes	Needs BIOS 3.03 or newer

Expansion Cards

Card Name	PCI/USB ID	Working?	Notes
USB-C	N/A	Yes
USB-A	N/A	Yes
MicroSD	090c:3350	Yes
HDMI	32ac:0002	Yes
DisplayPort	32ac:0003	Yes
Storage 250GB	13fe:6500	Yes
Storage 1TB	13fe:6500	Yes
Ethernet	0bda:8156	Yes

Headset jack

On Intel and AMD motherboards, when powersave activates and deactivates on the sound card, there is a small noisy popping sound or a buzzing sound.

The number of seconds after which, if there is no sound activity, the kernel puts the audio module into powersaving, therefore producing the pop or buzz noise, is stored in /sys/module/snd_hda_intel/parameters/power_save.

You can deactivate powersave for the sound card entirely by passing power_save=0 as a module option to snd_hda_intel, as described here.

If you are using TLP, you can instead set the SOUND_POWER_SAVE_ variables in /etc/tlp.conf.

Speakers

By default, the speakers do not sound very balanced (due to downward firing speakers), so you may want to use an equalizer to fix this. One way is to install EasyEffects and use one of the presets in this github repo, such as philonmetal.json.

Display

The Framework Laptop 13 has a TFT-LCD display [1], manufactured by BOE, that is uncalibrated from factory, giving a suboptimal default sRGB coverage. It is thus recommended to apply an ICC profile to have better color reproduction. [2]

• Intel Framework 13 ICC color profile: https://www.notebookcheck.net/uploads/tx_nbc2/BOE_CQ_______NE135FBM_N41_01.icm
• AMD Framework 13 ICC color profile: https://www.notebookcheck.net/uploads/tx_nbc2/BOE_CQ_______NE135FBM_N41_03.icm

HDMI Audio Output

On Intel 11thGen there is a problem where an HDMI TV or HDMI VideoProjector is recognized as an Audio Output Device but no sound is heard when playing music. The HDMI TV output sound correctly using a fresh installed Windows operating system. For correcting this issue you have to first install the sof-firmware package, then you have to pass dsp_driver=3 as a module option to snd_intel_dspcfg so it uses the SOF version instead of the legacy one.

Firmware

BIOS Updates

Updates are generally available as UEFI Shell updates from Framework directly. LVFS support is in testing.

Generation	Stable	Beta	LVFS	Notes
Intel 11th Gen	3.19		3.17	There will be no LVFS release for 3.19 because it has an Intel CSME update. An UEFI Shell update method is still not available for Linux.
Intel 12th Gen	3.08			Later batches come with 3.05 "to resolve an in-factory specific issue"[3]. Warning: After updating your BIOS to version 3.06 or 3.08, you cannot downgrade to version 3.04 or 3.05 as it will result in the left side ports to stop functioning properly.
Intel 13th Gen	3.03			Some units have shipped with 3.04 but is not yet listed on the Framework BIOS pages
AMD Ryzen 7040	3.05		3.05	If you have a batch 1 or 2 device, make sure you upgrade to at least 3.03 first. It comes preinstalled on batch 3 and later.

The BIOS can be updated by EFI shell script placed on a bootable USB flash drive. This firmware update method clears EFI bootloaders registered in NVRAM, so having a recovery disk or alternate method of reinstalling your bootloader(s) handy is recommended. If your bootloader installs itself as the EFI fallback at esp/EFI/BOOT/BOOTX64.EFI (systemd-boot will by default, GRUB will with GRUB#Default/fallback boot path), no recovery disk is necessary, but your bootloader may need to be reinstalled to restore its NVRAM entry.

To check which bios is currently installed without rebooting into the bios itself is possible with:

# dmidecode -s bios-version

LVFS

Support for fwupd is in testing [4], and can be enabled by running:

$ fwupdmgr enable-remote lvfs-testing

Note:

• For AMD 7040 series laptops you should not enable testing remotes if you want to use only released BIOS updates and not those in beta testing [5][6].
• 11th Gen Intel Mainboards with BIOS versions previous to 3.17 do not have capsule update support. To upgrade to newer versions with the support, add the following fwupd configuration changes, update to 3.17 or higher, and then revert the change after the BIOS is updated:

/etc/fwupd/fwupd.conf

[uefi_capsule]
DisableCapsuleUpdateOnDisk=true

Fingerprint Reader

Framework has published a guide for Intel 13th Gen and AMD to upgrade the firmware to a known working version.

Secure Boot

One can enroll custom keys into the Framework Laptop without any Option ROM concerns, or use the SHIM approach. See Secure Boot for details.

Suspend

On Intel boards, adding the kernel parameter acpi_osi="!Windows 2020" fixes a regression in s2idle, making the keyboard backlight and power button correctly turn off when suspending, as well as decreasing battery drain in suspend to about 1%/hour[7].

If your system fails to wake up from suspend due to the SSD disconnecting, you can try putting nvme.noacpi=1 in your kernel parameters. This may also improve battery life in suspend, if your SSD has a bad ACPI implementation. This should only be used on Intel boards, as on AMD it will cause the issue, instead of fixing it.

Warning: Some NVMe drives do not successfully wake from the deep sleep state described below, disconnecting from the laptop and becoming inaccessible until a reboot, which typically causes the laptop to lock up. One example is the Sabrent Rocket NVMe 4.0[8][9]. Before enabling this sleep state in a production installation, you may wish to test the suspend functionality of your NVMe drive from the Arch installer environment so as not to cause corruption.

See Power management/Suspend and hibernate#Changing suspend method if you want to use S3 sleep instead of s2idle.

Fn key after suspend

Some users on 11th-generation Intel boards report that after resuming from suspend, the Fn key and/or media keys no longer work. The workaround is to blacklist the cros_ec_lpcs module:

/etc/modprobe.d/crocs_ec_lpcs.conf

blacklist cros_ec_lpcs

Suspend-then-hibernate on AMD version

For AMD versions, systemd's suspend-then-hibernate will wake up after exactly 5 minutes (regular suspend works). Until the kernel patch [10] is merged, add the kernel parameter rtc_cmos.use_acpi_alarm=1 to use the proper wakeup mechanism.

Touchpad

There are reports of the touchpad exhibiting issues (e.g. pointer does not move, two-finger scroll does not work, etc.) after waking from sleep. Disabling PS/2 mouse emulation under Advanced in the BIOS seems to resolve the issues[11].

Interact with system

You can interact with your system using framework-system-git^AUR.

Note: On AMD boards, /dev/cros_ec won't be available for framework_tool to use without the following unmerged patchset (as of 6.6.4). If secure boot is not enabled, the tool can bypass the kernel and talk directly to the EC with the --driver portio option. With secure boot, the only way to use it will be by patching the kernel or waiting until those patches are merged (see this issue for details).

On 11th and 12th Gen Intel boards, you can also interact with the embedded controller using fw-ectool-git^AUR.

Warning: The Embedded Controller on your Framework Laptop handles low level functions, including power sequencing the system. Modifying the EC code can cause your system to not power on or boot or cause damage to the mainboard, battery, or other parts of the system or devices attached to the system. Hardware damage caused by EC firmware modifications would not be covered under the Framework Limited Warranty.

Function keys

Key	Visible?1	Marked?2	Effect
Fn+Esc	Yes	Yes	Toggles Fn lock
F1	Yes	Yes	XF86AudioMute
F2	Yes	Yes	XF86AudioLowerVolume
F3	Yes	Yes	XF86AudioRaiseVolume
F4	Yes	Yes	XF86AudioPrev
F5	Yes	Yes	XF86AudioPlay
F6	Yes	Yes	XF86AudioNext
F7	Yes	Yes	XF86MonBrightnessDown
F8	Yes	Yes	XF86MonBrightnessUp
F9	Yes	Yes	Super_L+p
F10	Yes	Yes	XF86RFKill, soft blocks wlan and bluetooth
F11	Yes	Yes	Print
F12	Yes	Yes	XF86AudioMedia
Fn+Delete	Yes	Yes	Insert
Fn+Space	Yes	Yes	Controls the keyboard backlight
Fn+b	No	No	Control_L+Break
Fn+k	No	No	Scroll_Lock
Fn+p	No	No	Pause
Fn+Left	Yes	Yes	Home
Fn+Right	Yes	Yes	End
Fn+Up	Yes	Yes	Prior/PgUp
Fn+Down	Yes	Yes	Next/PgDn

1. The key is visible to xev and similar tools.
2. The physical key has a symbol on it, which describes its function.

Ambient light sensor

Should work out of the box with iio-sensor-proxy. On GNOME it is enough to install the package and restart the session (or reboot, just in case). Then run monitor-sensor to check if it is working.

Fan speed control

You can force the fan speed to any value between 0 and 100 using this tool: https://gitlab.howett.net/DHowett/ectool

$ ectool --interface=lpc fanduty 1OO

to return to automatic mode use this command:

$ ectool --interface=lpc autofanctrl

In the meantime: https://lore.kernel.org/chrome-platform/20231005160701.19987-1-dustin@howett.net/ for direct support of the EC chromium driver.

Troubleshooting

Stuttering, flickering and periodic freeze

There are reports of stuttering, flickering and periodic freezes on the laptop. Disabling Panel Self-Refresh (as explained in Intel graphics#Screen flickering) has been reported to work. However it is helpful for battery life, so it should be left on if there are no issues.

This can also happen if you have installed xf86-video-intel instead of using modesetting, see the note at Intel graphics#Installation.

Two/three finger clicks

By default, the touchpad provides middle and right click by clicking on specific regions (bottom middle for middle click and bottom right corner for right click). To switch this two-finger click for right click and three-finger click for middle click, you will need to set the "click method" via libinput. First, find your "Touchpad" device name:

$ xinput

And then set the click method, where device is the name (or ID) found in the previous step:

$ xinput set-prop "device" "libinput Click Method Enabled" 0 1

To make this persistent, put it in a startup script. Alternatively, if using X11, one can create a custom Xorg configuration file with the appropriate settings (see libinput#Via Xorg configuration file).

HiDPI settings

Using 1,5 scaling factor is suggested. For more details, see HiDPI.

Lowering fan noise

This applies to the Intel version only. AMD users should use power-profiles-daemon.

The handling of fans can be significantly improved by using the thermald service. Install the package and then you can Start and Enable the service via the thermald.service unit file.

Changing the brightness of the monitor does not work

See Backlight#xbacklight returns : No outputs have backlight property.

For Alder Lake CPUs a solution for using the backlight keys instead of the light sensor is to deactivate the ambient light sensor.

/etc/modprobe.d/framework-als-deactivate.conf

blacklist hid_sensor_hub

Reboot is required, the light sensor module will be deactivated and the backlight keys work.

Bootmanager flashing black screen and not loading operating system

If your Framework laptop loads the bootloader and can recognize the EFI system partition on your flash drive or m.2. drive, but cannot load your boot manager (it only flashes a black screen before returning to the bootloader), you must disable Secure Boot.

1. Reboot holding F2. There is a bug in some versions of the BIOS that prevents the F2 key on the builtin laptop keyboard from being recognized during reboot or power up. The workaround is to connect an external USB keyboard to the laptop an hold the F2 key on the external keyboard while rebooting or powering up the laptop. After the laptop has entered the BIOS settings the builtin keyboard can be used and the external one can be disconnected.
2. Go to the Security Tab
3. Secure boot defaults to ON; disable it
4. Save changes and restart

Intel Wi-Fi 6E AX210 reset/ low throughput / "Microcode SW error"

Under high stress, Wi-Fi device restarts and network speeds become abysmally slow or non-responsive until disconnecting and reconnecting to WiFi network.[12]

This issue has been observed by owners of other manufacturers' laptops (not just framework). [13]

Disabling IEEE 802.11ax seems to be a suitable workaround for the time being. [14]

/etc/modprobe.d/iwlwifi.conf

options iwlwifi disable_11ax=Y

Intel is aware[15] of the issue and there is a patch[16] that fix slow tx after restart, and another[17] that address the SW error.

Fingerprint reader device disconnected error

When the fingerprint reader has been used to enroll a fingerprint on Windows, and you later attempt to use the reader under Linux without first unenrolling your print from within Windows, fprintd can fail to work. In this situation, upon enrolling with fprintd-enroll, the command will hang, as fprintd has crashed.

The best way to deal with this, if you still have access to Windows, is to boot back in and unenroll your fingerprint from there. If this is not possible, you can try a script posted by someone on the Framework laptop forums.

Low framerate or stuttering webcam

This issue can occur if the program displaying the webcam feed is using the YUYV 4:2:2 color format. Most GUI camera applications do not allow for configuring this. Some applications that will let you configure this include guvcview and obs-studio, and they also appear to work with the default configuration.

You can also open the webcam using vlc with:

$ vlc v4l2:///dev/video1 --v4l2-chroma MJPG

or mpv with:

$ mpv --cache=no --demuxer-lavf-format=video4linux2 --demuxer-lavf-o=video_size=1920x1080,input_format=mjpeg av://v4l2:/dev/video0

12th gen Turbo-Boost on battery with tlp

By default the 12th gen will not Turbo-Boost on battery if tlp is installed. This can configured in tlp's configuration.

/etc/tlp.conf

CPU_ENERGY_PERF_POLICY_ON_AC=balance_performance
CPU_ENERGY_PERF_POLICY_ON_BAT=balance_performance

12th & 13th gen brightness and airplane mode keys

On the 12th and 13th gen motherboards there is a bug^{[dead link 2023-10-29 ⓘ]} where ALS and the brightness up/down including the airplane mode keys conflict. In order to make the brightness and airplane mode keys work in the detriment of using the ambient light sensor, blacklist the hid_sensor_hub module.

Ethernet not working with tlp

By default tlp will power limit the framework ethernet adapter. This can be changed in tlp's configuration where 0bda:8156 is the ID of the framework ethernet adapter.

/etc/tlp.conf

USB_DENYLIST="0bda:8156"

(AMD) TLP is not advised for power management. PPD is recommended

Framework Laptop 13 AMD Ryzen 7040 Series configurations are advised to use power-profiles-daemon (PPD) instead of TLP, which is actively discouraged for this processor. For further discussion see this Framework community thread.

(AMD) Flickering, artifacts and a white screen when a second monitor is connected

When a second monitor is connected (possibly only with higher resolutions or refresh rates, and possibly only in Wayland), an issue can be triggered where graphical artifacts or a white image will appear, sometimes showing the original content in a flicker as screen content changes. This can be resolved by adding amdgpu.sg_display=0 as a kernel parameter.

(AMD) GPU Lockup during graphical load (system still accessible through ssh)

A number of measures seemed to reduce the chances of this happening, and complete system stability was achieved by combining them. It's possible some or all of these won't be necessary as the kernel and firmware are updated.

• Replacing the linux-firmware package with linux-firmware-git^AUR (make sure to check linux-firmware-git^AUR is newer than linux-firmware before doing this)
• In the BIOS, set the iGPU Configuration to UMA_GAME_OPTIMIZED
• Setting /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_dpm_force_performance_level to high or low instead of auto (in tlp this can be achieved with RADEON_DPM_PERF_LEVEL_ON_AC=high and RADEON_DPM_PERF_LEVEL_ON_BAT=low)

Since the use of TLP with an AMD CPU is not advised, setting the performance level depending on the presence of a power supply can be archived with a simple udev rule and a small script:

 /etc/udev/rules.d/60-power-dpm-force-performance-level.rules 

SUBSYSTEM=="power_supply" RUN+="/usr/local/bin/set_dpm_perf_level.sh %E{POWER_SUPPLY_ONLINE}"

 /usr/local/bin/set_dpm_perf_level.sh 

#!/bin/bash

#default level
DRM_PERF_LEVEL=low
#evaluate argument passed by udev 
if [ $1 -eq 1 ] ; then
    DRM_PERF_LEVEL=high
else
    DRM_PERF_LEVEL=low
fi

#set drm performance level
echo $DRM_PERF_LEVEL > /sys/class/drm/card1/device/power_dpm_force_performance_level

(AMD) Flickering graphical corruption on a single monitor

Providing additional memory to the iGPU appears to fix this problem, as advised by Framework Support in this Community thread. Follow this guide from Framework to enable allocating more iGPU RAM from the BIOS.

(AMD) Unable to reconnect to wifi after hibernation with kernel 6.7

A bug was introduced in kernel version 6.7 that causes the Wifi connection to not be recoverable after hibernation. A fix has already been proposed and should make it to version 6.8. Aside from patching the kernel or using the lts version one workaround is to use modprobe to remove and re-add the mt7921e module as described in this community thread.

Additional Hardware

Docking Stations

Check the USB-C/Thunderbolt Dock Megathread on the Framework community boards for up to date information on functioning docks.

Note: On AMD systems, only the top left and top right ports (the rear ports) have Thunderbolt 3 support, in addition to being USB 4. Make sure to plug a USB-C module in one of those two ports and connect the dock there.

External GPU

Name	Model Number	Interface	Power Delivery?	eGPU?	Notes
AKITO Node Pro Thunderbolt 3	T3NP	USB-C	Yes	No	Errors with PCIe bus expansion for eGPU, 3.16.5 kernel, 3.07 firmware
Sonnet	eGPU 550	USB-C	Yes	Yes	Tested in kernel 5.15 and above
Razer	Core	USB-C	Yes	Yes	Tested in kernel 5.15 and above
Mantiz MZ-03 Saturn Pro eGPU V2	MZ-03-EU-SG	USB-C	Yes	Yes	EU-edition, Potentially needs intel_iommu=on,Tested in kernel 5.15 and above 3.06 Firmware 3.10 and 12th gen framework

See also

• Framework website
• Framework community thread for Arch Linux
• Framework community thread for battery life tuning