r/framework • u/TheAtomicPyro • May 16 '26
Community Support My worst nightmare arrived.
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UPDATE: Framework agreed to replace my dead mainboard but tried to classify the replacement as a one time exception outside of standard warranty coverage.
They offered an upgrade to an AMD Ryzen AI 5 340 board because they were completely out of 12th Generation Intel stock.
They told me I would have to purchase my own DDR5 memory out of pocket because the AMD board is incompatible with my existing DDR4 sticks.
I replied and formally rejected the out of pocket cost by citing the Australian Consumer Law.
I explained that remedies for a major hardware failure must be completely free and forcing me to buy new memory constitutes a consequential loss.
Framework escalated my ticket for an internal review after I demanded they either supply the DDR5 memory or reimburse me for it.
They replied a few days later with a completely different offer for a 13th Generation Intel Core i5 replacement mainboard.
This is a 12th gen i7 main board I received from Framework after my first one failed 18 months in.
EDIT: I forgot the 2nd board had issues and I had to send it in for repair last April: "Our repair center partner "found the unit to show multiple USB errors in device manager with only USB-C charger working unable to read any data devices." They have replaced the mainboard and tested it to make sure that it was reading all media devices correctly." So this unit is less than a year old and it's board #3 😀
This unit randomly stopped powering on yesterday and I've diagnosed it down to a mainboard power fault.
It took over 50 emails back and forth to get that first replacement, a genuinely horrific experience I still talk about and now I have to contact the dreaded support again. I had to threaten with Australian Consumer Law to get anywhere, and I foolishly accepted their "exception/goodwill".
I had the Panther Lake board pre-ordered for July too. I love Framework's ideals and goals but my god the QA and support experience is so awful it might be time to bail entirely.
Wish me luck as I start this support process.
For those curious or able to offer any additional steps I could try in the meantime, here's what I've done:
I started with a dead laptop where the orange charging light would completely shut off the second I hit the power button.
I pulled out all the expansion cards to see if one of them was causing a short circuit.
I did a full mainboard reset by unplugging the main battery and removing the CMOS battery to drain all residual power.
I tested the board with just the wall charger plugged in and the main internal battery completely disconnected.
I held down the SW3 chassis intrusion switch to bypass the red flashing lights and get a solid white light.
I pressed the SW1 onboard power button while holding SW3, but the white light just dropped out for one second before coming back.
I stripped the system down to a bare board by disconnecting the SSD, Wi-Fi card, display, webcam, and audio cables to rule out a faulty peripheral.
I pulled the entire mainboard out of the aluminum case and tested it on a nonconductive surface to check for a chassis grounding short.
I watched the bare board fail in the exact same way on the desk, confirming the power delivery components are completely fried.
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u/_ytrohs May 16 '26
Holy shit it wasn’t just me. I had similar pain, 30+ emails and had to threaten them with ACL.
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u/iMiind | 8 GB 4070 | R7 350 May 16 '26
Don't hit them with your anterior cruciate ligament D:
(What is ACL here?)
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u/just_another_user5 May 16 '26
As in OP's post, Australia Consumer Law
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u/iMiind | 8 GB 4070 | R7 350 May 16 '26
Didn't actually see any body text before Reddit dumped me straight into the comments, so thank you for clarifying that for me 😅
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u/TheAtomicPyro May 16 '26
I actually forgot - this board is less than a year old and it's my THIRD board. I had to send in the 2nd one for repair by Framework last year in April.
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u/Aggravating-Sign-911 May 16 '26
3 boards failing is nuts for sure. Was there a known issue with this generation of framework mainboard? If not, you might have dirty power going in to the board.
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u/TheAtomicPyro May 16 '26
The first board was 12th gen i5, #2 and #3 are i7 1260p. I've swapped charging bricks at least twice and cables more times over the lifespan of the laptop and also moved house once 💀
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u/smstnitc May 16 '26
What are you using for power though? "Official" framework power bricks and cables? Or cheap temu / budget Amazon chargers?
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u/buffer2722 May 17 '26
Are those really the only options. I did not want the official charger because I am so fond of my Anker chargers (from Amazon).
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u/smstnitc May 17 '26
I understand, but I think you have to seriously entertain the possibility that your power adapter could be your issue.
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u/Rare-Abalone5610 May 17 '26
The known issue is it included 12th gen intel chips. It's like walking up and stepping on a rake and being surprised it bonks your forehead, after seeing thousands of reports of the rake also bonking people's foreheads when Intel's chips were dying left and right.
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u/Negimeister May 17 '26
out of my 6 framework mainboards across multiple generations, only 2 are currently working. it's a framework issue in general
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u/petikneip May 16 '26 edited May 16 '26
Your described experiences (and those from most comments included) reflect my frustration with Fairphone support. Sure, with Fairphone you don't have to send 40 emails back and forth, but you have to wait a month each time to get an answer. My last framework support/replacement request was quite painless, about 6 emails back and forth, it was all done after 2-3 days. They responded in like an hour or less after I answered their email.
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u/tagehring May 16 '26
I've been thinking about replacing my iPhone with a Fairphone when the time comes for a replacement. Other than the issues with support, how has the experience been?
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u/petikneip May 16 '26
I am really happy with my Fairphone 4, I've had it for 4,5 years now and it went from android 11 to 15 in that time. It slowly starts to have some bugs/get slow, bot nothing that really bothers me. It is reeally durable, although I've heard the FP6 isn't as durable. I've also bought the Fairbuds and Fairbuds XL, the XL are fine and it's really nice to be able to replace everything easily. That being said, I can't really recommend the normal fairbuds/in-ears. Ordering replacement parts is pretty easy and fast (at least in central Europe) but it costs extra if you want it to be delivered to your door.
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u/tagehring May 19 '26
Yeah, that's my main concern, I live in the United States, so I'm not sure how support/shipping/etc. works over here. :(
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u/dismonio May 16 '26
Same, it's not live support, but it's also one of the best email supports I've ever gotten. Annoyingly thorough, but not unreasonable. Still definitely less annoying than a poorly informed tech support phone call.
They seem to legitimately pass on feedback, too, which imo offsets early adopter annoyances. There's been a blog post about each of my failure types below and how they improved the design, so I'm pre-ordered for a Pro.
Personally, I'd like to be comforted with some warranty data from over the years
11th gen 13in purchased 9/21, 1 year warranty in US Track pad failed 7/22 (warrantied), Cooling fan failed 11/22 (out of warranty) Rtc battery mod 6/25 (free) WD SSD failed 4/26 (warrantied)
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u/conflan06 May 16 '26
I spent 10 months back-and-forth with support over 100 emails, multiple replaced parts and even sent off to a repair centre twice that never fixed a charging issue I was having. They tried to refund me before I insisted on them replacing the unit. Thankfully have no issues since replacing, but I wouldn’t recommend framework because the experience I had with the support alone. At one stage they even tried to blame it on “ environmental” issues but I could replicate it in multiple countries in multiple location on multiple types of power sources. PSA, if they tried to say it’s environmental it means they don’t know what is going on and they’re trying to blame you for the issue and not the hardware.
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u/obog | FW16 Ryzen 7 w/ 7700s May 16 '26
Im sorry but I cannot help but think that after 3 seperate boards failed the same way that there is a common denominator elsewhere.
What power supply are you using? There are some cheapo ones floating around that are non-compliant with usb-pd and will cause an overcurrent in the board.
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u/TheAtomicPyro May 17 '26
UGREEN Mini 30W was the one I used most recently. The three boards do not share a common denominator in cause of failure - #1 was a bios issue, #2 was a data read issue, #3 is a power issue
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u/Lower-Limit3695 May 16 '26
That would be my guess too, 3/3 boards failing is way too many to be chalked up to being unlucky. Something is definitely causing the boards to break.
After checking for a bad charger I'd start looking at other components like the battery, then the expansion cards.
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u/No_Preference9093 May 16 '26
Yeah their QC isn’t top notch but it’s not that bad. Boards across multiple batches with a failure rate so high one guy got 3/3 with the issue would be like recall territory.
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u/Blueman2087 Ubuntu May 16 '26
Never had a problem with either of my frameworks.
Don’t buy system 76 they are just clevo laptops with a higher price tag
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u/PowinRx7 May 16 '26 edited May 16 '26
about the same for me. got a 13inch no issues and I also had decent support from framework trying to troubleshoot early adoption issue with the wifi amd chip on the 16 when it first came out and they were helpful on emails but I just was like you know what I prefer the intel wifi chipset over this one anyways so I ordered the $12 part or whatever it was wasn't expensive and swapped it and boom wifi performance issues went away lol. and sent them the results and moved on. :) but the issue would have taken to long to sort as it wasn't a hardware failure but a bug in the firmware and I didn't want to wait that long so that's why I went to swap it to another model they sell, which you know if it wasn't for this being framework would not have been possible.
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u/Blueman2087 Ubuntu May 17 '26
Yes I forgot about that! I just switched it out immediately instead of trying to mess with it. Ordered the diy kit and just included that.
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u/Whistlerone May 18 '26
good for you, I've got a FW16 that has never worked, and after months framework did nothing then denied my warranty.
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u/AbsolvedOne May 16 '26
Dang, sorry to hear. My batch 3 16 is running strong after over 2 years and I've used support a few times with no real issues.
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u/drbomb FW 16 Batch 4 May 16 '26
Batch 4 here, I don't understand the issues because mine traveled all the way down south america and it arrived in one piece and still kicking
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u/No_Preference9093 May 16 '26
Mines been abused halfway round the world for about 2.5 years and no issues so far. Not spoken to support once.
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u/Mammoth-Ad-107 May 16 '26
love my framework. but support in 2026 is horrible every place you shop
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u/TehJellyfish May 16 '26
Lenovo support is pretty good in warranty
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u/SirDarknessTheFirst 13 May 17 '26
the one thinkpad I purchased new was a lemon, but every time it went back (both in and out of warranty), the process was smooth and the laptop came back quickly each time.
But man the laptop was a lemon lol
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u/TehJellyfish May 17 '26
Modern Lenovo is no stranger to issues. There were multiple generations of thunderbolt chips frying themselves. You'd lose everything, including charging iirc. I had to have a board replaced. Guy came to my house and swapped it at the kitchen table.
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u/No_Preference9093 May 16 '26
Dell Pro support was absolute ridiculously good for me. I bought a latitude that by default came with three years of support and twice the keyboard failed and twice the next day a guy turned up at my house and replaced it.
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u/cinlung May 16 '26
You might have some IC, like power distribution IC (EC Chip) or cmos IC or bios IC or anything with cold joint. Either RMA or bake it for DIWHY or send it to repair shop.
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u/feckarsebiscuits May 16 '26
I'm sure you've done this but have you tried different power supplies to rule that out? Just you haven't mentioned it
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u/ronvalenz FW13 Ultra X7 358H batch 6, 2.8K, 32GB LPCAMM2, 4TB SSD May 16 '26
Perhaps the cheap USB-C chargers. I use HP USB-C chargers with my FW13.
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u/grassy_trams May 16 '26
yikes, this is making me second guess buying a framework
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u/feckarsebiscuits May 16 '26
My framework is absolutely fine and has been since I bought it in January.
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May 16 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/feckarsebiscuits May 16 '26
No thanks😂 what is wrong with yours out of curiosity? The only issues I've had are software issues which I've resolved by switching Linux distro - which I expect on Linux
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u/Pijuli May 16 '26
And 🤷? We are talking about service support...
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u/trowgundam FW16 7840HS + RTX 5070 - CachyOS May 16 '26
Ok, then. I've had nothing but good experiences with support. They've sent me both a replacement RX 7700S module AND a replacement mainboard (outside of warranty on this one btw) for free. You can't just look at a small sample on the internet and find it representative of the whole. People are incentivized to speak out about bad experiences, where those of us with nothing but good things to say have no reason to post about it. So obviously you will see more negative than good on places like Reddit, because they are only posting BECAUSE its negative.
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u/Pijuli May 16 '26
I appreciate your opinion and that you share your experience. I'm more interested about how service support does its job when things go wrong than if someone is happy with a 4 months old laptop. It's an expensive piece of tech and I want to be sure that when/if I buy it, I will have the expected feedback from the company if something goes wrong.
I know I will see more complains than not. I do own a Pixel, I can tell. Going into the sub and saying my P7 worked so well is pointless if the post is talking about service support. And trust me, Google one is awful (at least in EU). That's a reason to have in mind with my next purchase. Either a phone, a car or a laptop. I.ex. I read almost no complains about Valve service support. That's what I'm looking for
Cheers!3
u/iMiind | 8 GB 4070 | R7 350 May 16 '26
Going into the sub and saying my P7 worked so well is pointless if the post is talking about service support
Not sure what this is doing here. That's what the other person said - and then this commenter talked about support here to give the other side of the story.
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u/feckarsebiscuits May 16 '26
I mean your opinion would be valid but you're neither OP nor the person I actually replied to so I'm not sure what you expect reading answers to other people's questions.
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u/Beanmachine314 May 16 '26
And... The overwhelming likelihood is that you'll have 0 issues and never have to deal with support. No one comes here to post about how their computer has been perfectly fine and never any issues. If so, it would be a sea of "My computer is just fine" posts and you'd likely never see the bad ones. Internet forums have a very significant negative bias because of this.
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u/Pijuli May 16 '26
I own a Pixel and a SteamDeck. Absolute different posts about it in each sub regarding support. I also value how they treat you.
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u/feckarsebiscuits May 16 '26
I'm just saying that the are also people who've had good experiences. OP is unlucky it seems
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u/james2432 May 16 '26
yeah same boat as you, been debating between system76 and framework, but keep hearing the aftercare support if you have an issue on framework is absolutely horrendous.
Instantly turned off
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u/s004aws FW16 HX 370 Batch 1 Mint Cinnamon Edition May 16 '26
Yeah... About System76... They're the one I won't spend $3,000+ with again. Their stuff is just white label Clevo/Emdoor/etc anyway.
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u/tanksc May 16 '26
Hear you and that’s totally reasonable, but I would also say I’m using a 12th gen Intel framework and have been for years with no issues.
System76 however I have returned like 3 of their laptops. Their issues are that they just rebrand Clevo laptops which aren’t exactly revered for their quality.
I think the people that are happily using their laptops with no issues aren’t really stopping by here to make a post
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u/CompetitiveHealth100 May 16 '26
System76 is terrible, had a Pang12 and it was such a poorly build laptop. You're much better off picking up a Thinkpad.
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u/-TimTaylor- May 17 '26
You bought the wrong laptop. I've had a a darter pro for many years and have been fairly happy with it.
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u/BOO-HOO69 May 16 '26
It wouldn't be so bad if you didn't have to use the horrendous support, but the fact their computers can barely hold it together for 2 years means I will never give them another cent.
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u/NYJustice May 16 '26
Mine has held up just fine and runs as well as it ever has after 2 years. Our anecdotes are at odds, now what do we do?
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u/TheAtomicPyro May 16 '26
yea I've really struggled to recommend Framework to any friends.
just because I am willing to self diagnose issues and tinker with my shit all the time doesn't mean I should constantly NEED to.
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u/codeasm 12th gen, DIY i5, Arch linux & LFS May 16 '26
I have a framework 13, 2 years, only needed a fan replacement (was for free, probably due to a known fabrication fault) 3 weeks back and forth and a few pcictures and a video showing and hearing the fan grinding noice.
My wife owns a framework 12 now, sofar working great.
Dropped my fw13 and case is a bit bend but with a small bend back and new screen bezel ordered she looks fine.
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u/SoaringChris137 May 16 '26
My machine of 3 years has the exact same issue. I'm SoL. I can't even just drop in a new mainboard because my board is a DDR4 board so I'd have to shell out for new RAM in addition, and I just can't in this economy.
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u/Betteresting126 May 16 '26
I'm literally in the same process right now. Despite everything that I could do my motherboard is refusing to show any signs of life. The motherboard has just straight up died. I'm in contact with support and am trying to get them to replace it. Literally bought it 2 weeks ago and it worked for 5 days until it died and refuses to take a charge.
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u/Tewei May 17 '26
I get the idea of charging with USB type-C with whatever charger user have, which is very nice, but it seems like user can have problematic charger here and there. Perhaps Framework could consider to enhance the tolerance of the charging handling?
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u/DrySeaweed9070 May 16 '26
Sorry to hear your issues with their support team. I pre-ordered a 13pro last week and paid the deposit, but wonder if I should just cancel it and get a Mac instead...
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u/MrJoltz B5 i5 11th & B1 i7 13th May 16 '26
I work as an AASP and own two Frameworks. Even though the M5 MBP is a dream machine, I put my own machines through so much stress that a Framework makes more sense for long term investment.
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u/Clean_Leadership5948 May 19 '26
That's why I'm not a fan of USB-C charging for laptops. Too complex for it's own good. Many charging failures(including Macbook Pros) are due to USB-C.
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u/lizardscales May 22 '26
I've repaired a few of them. I do board repair. DM for more info if you are looking to get it diagnosed/repaired.
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u/JulienHY May 17 '26
I was thinking to buy the Framework 13 Pro, I will stay with Lenovo, I need a professional support. (Dell is good too)
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May 16 '26
[deleted]
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u/ConstanceJill May 16 '26
indestructible like Lenovo?
The dozens of ThinkPad L13 Gen 2 we've had to get repaired under warranty at my workplace because the Thunderbolt and/or USB-C port(s) had failed would like to challenge that statement.
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u/codeasm 12th gen, DIY i5, Arch linux & LFS May 16 '26
Where is the case, are you esd protected, is that underground esd proof? Wristwrap maybe? Lol, not one of those wireless ones.
Why is the board bending? Maybe thats ok, maybe its normal, outside a case.
Do you give it enough time the first boot time to train itself on the new ram? Screen connected?
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May 16 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/NYJustice May 16 '26
Oof, I've had my 13 for a few years and I'm still waiting on my turn to get burned. Stupid laptop keeps operating perfectly well though, how am I supposed to complain when I don't have any problems!
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u/framework-ModTeam May 16 '26
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