And they've introduced a new problem: rather than buying a standardized USB-C dongle, you've got a new one-off form factor.

The designs are available on GitHub under Creative Commons licensing: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards

We've seen both community developed Expansion Cards and other device makers starting to adopt Expansion Cards.

I appreciate that, and my comment wasn't a knock against your product. I like what y'all are doing, it's just not my personal preference.

Don't think of it as a dongle. It allows them to build a combinatorial number of SKUs off of a linear number of them. Basically, you get a fully custom laptop body.

Why? You can just load the laptop with four USB-C adapters and stick to USB-C for everything if you want to.

Not really, you're perfectly free to put USB-C ports in and you can use your standardised dongles if you want. Or mix and match.

I can't imagine what other existing form factor would have been suitable and more useful than them just creating their own and open sourcing the design.

it would have been interesting if they had reused the physical pcmcia form factor for it, just changing the pins for a usb-c port

At least the EU hasn't regulated away the possibility of this to some brilliant idea. To me it's also pretty solid - the built in dongle as it is means i can use my laptop on my lap with different wires - or on my work bench with less clutter...

Can you not plug a regular USB-C dongle in to the recessed port?

Or use the included USB-C card and plug your dongle into that.

If you want to continue working with USB-C you have the freedom to install a USB-C module, so I'm not sure what new problem you are identifying here. But, if you know ahead of time precisely what modules you need, you no longer have to have them dangling from your laptop.

I'm trying to conceive of what other possible solution there could be?

It’s a cutting off your nose to spite your face comment.

Is there even such a thing as a standard dongle? Pretty sure there isn’t. And as you say you can just use the USBC module and continue using your USBC dongle. I bet you could even 3D print an enclosure to make sure that your existing dongle fits nicely into the module port so you don’t need the module.

You can still do that?

And I don't think of or treat them like dongles - I don't carry spares around, I just have the configuration that makes sense for me. (I don't even have spares to change it, but with a holiday coming up I did think I'd swap one for an SD card reader if I had one.)

It's like PCMCIA for the USB-C era.

A lot of it is a rigidity and ease of use thing. If it's integrated it travels with the laptop. If it's external, you never have it when you need it.

Also, it’s not going to snap anything going into a bag in a hurry / without remembering the dongle is in.

and best of all, if I do leave something attached and shove it into my bag and break something, I'm breaking a $9 add-on card instead of the type-c port on my laptop's motherboard.

It would also benefit a lot from a dedicated external multiport USB-C Hub with recessed ports so they can be used to plug more expansion cards than the ones the laptop could allow in its own ports. That could also allow to set some standards for the development of bigger expansion cards carrying hardware that needs more space.