Blog Post: Librem 14 Features BIOS and EC Write Protection – Purism

Librem
#1

As we have said a few times already, we set out to build our dream laptop with the Librem 14. We approached our flagship Librem 13 laptop with a wishlist of features to fit into the reimagined Librem 14. As we have been able to confirm certain features with a strong degree of confidence (like having 2 SO-DIMM slots to double the max RAM to 64Gb) we have updated our specs and made new posts and today I’m excited to announce another item from our wishlist that we will be able to fit into the first generation Librem 14: BIOS and EC flash chip write protection with a hardware switch !

Full details are in the post:

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Are the IME changes by Purism reversible?
#2

You are a great company and your articles are always interesting. If I could I would buy all the products you make precisely because they are unique.
But I have to ask a question: you have only once proposed the sale in installments without interest for the purchase of your product and in this period of zero interest rates you do not take advantage of it to sell the products. Is there a reason?
Regards

#3

Thank you for your kind words!

In the past the service we used for a payment plan took on responsibility and risk for the debt from the customer and managed the process of receiving payments from the customer. This policy changed recently so we had to discontinue that option.

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#4

Is it a different EC as compared with the Librem 13 and hence(?) fixing the keyboard weirdness? (such as discussed here: The "| + \" key on the keyboard doesn't work, and installing non-gui distributions is impossible)

#5

@Kyle_Rankin Beside all the really great points about the upcoming 14, how is its backbone realized? How are the hinges physically fixed? Plastics included or full-metal only? Doesn’t seem a big point on the wishlist, but all other points can be disregarded, if that particular one isn’t met.

#6

I don’t have details on the specifics. I can say I understand where your question comes from and can assure you that the strength of the hinges is a big point on our wishlist for this redesign.

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#7

While I would assume the EC is different, I don’t know for sure. The longstanding “issue” with the keyboard in the past simply came down to the fact that the keyboard was programmed to be US International alternative, instead of the standard US layout. In that layout almost every key was the same as standard layout except for | which sent a different keysym. If one were to set the keyboard to the US International alternative layout instead of standard US layout, the | key worked as expected. Otherwise you’d have to do one of the documented workarounds to remap that key manually.

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Blog Post: Librem 14 Status Update: Shipping Starts in December
#8

The stability is something nobody cares about as everbody assumes it to be absolutely reliable by default. But it can become a very big issue once a problem occurs - or even worse a series of problems reported by several individuals. As my laptops hinge just broke during normal usage, every however genius device would be an absolut nogo if that stability-topic isn’t met.

But beside that, the 14 sounds absolutely amazing.

#9

What I’m saying is that it’s something Purism cares deeply about and we will make sure the Librem 14 hinges are sturdy.

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