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I use their Pocket reform option pretty regularly, its a gorgeous device. The keyboard is a delight to use and the community is very friendly and helpful. The RK3588 is also plenty fast for the programming I like to get up to -- mostly writing things in Go or Ocaml for myself, but also for larger tasks its worked fine.

It has rough edges but its very usable , especially for somone inclined to hack on their devices. My main trouble being my yearning to use Alpine on it but not quite having the know how personally to get it up and running.

I like it enough though, that I've also got the Next ordered, which I'm very excited for. Being able to upgrade them both more or less ad-infinitum while new boards come out is a big plus too.

For this kind of hobby device, I would love a different kind of approach that is more like an detachable independent tablet panel with a extended docking base both with CPUs - and hack on the smarts to make resources on the docking base seamlessly available between independent/docked states.

I'm intrigued by this, but waiting for the MNT Reform Next.. https://www.crowdsupply.com/mnt/mnt-reform-next

I think 1450 EUR for a 16GB RK3588 is hard to justify. Is the Rockchip open to begin with?

I'd go for a framework using the Roma or CIX boards if I wanted to go for an "open hardware but not really" goal.

Curious why they went with the i.MX8M SoC specifically — was it purely about open documentation, or did the memory bandwidth also factor into the decision?

It's an interesting concept, but perhaps a bit financially and environmentally wasteful, when you can get a 10 year old ThinkPad for 10% of the price that will perform roughly as well as this one. We don't need to bring more low-powered laptops into this world.

I wished it was easier to manufacture things. There is a reason that Apple is held in high regard, and looking at this makes abundantly clear, why.

I've been looking into switching away from apple and try to buy more EU based services and products.

I love the concept and might just buy one to support the project, but I want something sleeker for my daily use. So I'm considering slimbook & tuxedo atm as buy-from-eu options.

It's been a while since I've last seen a laptop powered by 18650s. The thickness seems to be directly the result of using them there.

As it's not very small, it would be a lot cooler if it had a full no compromise TKL mechanical keyboard.

Hi! I actually have, and have been using as my main device, an MNT Pocket Reform, and at one point was using an MNT Reform.

MNT's devices are honestly kinda incredible. I can't recommend them for everyone yet, though that will change soon. Both of them are a kind of "laptop of theseus"; you can open and change and repair them, and honestly I have. Both device's guts are dramatically different than where they started, but changes happened piecemeal.

The Pocket Reform is an incredibly cute device. I can't pull it out anywhere without people fawning over it. Not even just hackers! It's an open hardware cyberdeck you can use as your main device. What's not to love?

The MNT Reform Next will be closer to what many people want out of a laptop. It'll still be chonkier than a normal laptop. But again, these things are incredibly upgradeable and hackable.

Now for the caveats: for most people, I would wait until the MNT Quasar module comes out. The reason being is that while the current "best" module, the RK3588, is honestly pretty good with the 32gb version, it lacks one critical thing for most people and one other critical thing for me in particular. The first thing it lacks is support for suspend. Honestly, it does make working with a tiny computer like this a bit less appealing than the Pocket Reform's form factor could be, since what you really want to do is just be putting it to sleep and taking it out everywhere. The other thing is that Blender doesn't really run on the rk3588 either. You can kind of get a patched version working based on Lucie's patches, and I did, but it doesn't support the Eevee renderer, which is a must-have for me personally.

But the MNT Quasar board will be apparently fixing both of those above issues, and yes, at that point this will be a device that I can recommend generally. And I'll also note that I got the very first MNT Reform when it came out, and holy moly the state of the hardware now vs when it originally launched half a decade ago... it's hugely far between, but the amazing thing is that to get it up to the current state, I didn't need to throw things away, I could just open and tinker with things bit by bit.

In many ways, the MNT Pocket Reform reminds me of the book the main character has in the solarpunk book A Psalm for the Wild Built; a computer that is issued to you at the age of 16 and that which you carry with you for life. You can upgrade and repair it easily, but you don't need to throw it away.

So yeah, it's not for everyone. But if the idea of supporting repairable, upgradeable open hardware made by a lovely bunch of queers in Berlin sounds great? That you can hack on, that has a neat little community, that will be a conversation point amongst fellow hackers for its quirkiness? It's appealing to some, but not all.

Can you fly with stuff like this? I only wonder because of the battery setup. Very cool, I would personally use a regular track pad over the ball as I prefer as little mouse interaction as possible and it would stay out of the way better.

Trackball?

the trackball is interesting

Looks really cool!