Yes, a grading system would be better than simple pass/fail. It would take a lot of work to compile a list of hardware and rank how much each component promotes freedom, but I bet that FSF could find volunteers to work on it.
In my opinion, the FSF has largely fulfilled its original mission of a free operating system and free software applications. At this point, the critical work moves to free drivers, free firmware, and free hardware. It bothers me that the FSF does so little to engage the electronics industry. If the FSF was scoring devices in terms of their freedom promotion, the device makers might actually pay attention.
For example, the FSF could create a “Freedom Score”, that assigns a score between 0 and 100 to a device, based on how much free software and free hardware it contains. Purism used to have the highest laptop score in the industry. When System76 introduced laptops with Coreboot and free/open EC firmware, it would have closed the gap with Purism (with a reduction for proprietary WiFi firmware, but a gain for its free EC firmware). When MNT Reform ships, it will become the highest scoring laptop in the industry.
Currently reviews just say that the Dell XPS, TUXEDO InfinityBook Pro, Purism Librem 15, System76 Lemur Pro, and MNT Reform are Linux laptops, but imagine the dynamic if they get Freedom Scores of 55, 60, 75, 75 and 90, respectively. Suddenly, it becomes really clear which laptop is better in terms of software and hardware freedom, and I bet the MNT Reform would have more than 220 preorders.
Now imagine the dynamic with Dell engineers asking, “Can we switch the GPU from nVidia to AMD to get our score up to 60?” TUXEDO asks, “Can we finish our Coreboot port to get our score up to 70?” Purism asks, “Can we change our keyboard and fan controller, so they use free EC firmware to get 3 more points and beat System76?” System76 asks, “Can we switch our WiFi from Intel to Redpine Signals to eliminate the proprietary firmware and get another 2 points?” PINE64 asks, “Can we publish our schematics of the PineBook under the GPL to match the score of the MNT Reform?”
Suddenly, the device makers care what the FSF thinks, and they start talking to component makers, asking for free firmware, and they start asking Intel for permission to release their schematics under a free license. It sets a totally different dynamic in the industry.