Intel’s modular designs could make your next laptop last longer, but probably won’t deliver the holy grail of cheap GPU upgrades

The idea of a properly modular, easily upgradable PC is nothing new. After all, Framework has built a business on modular laptops. But it hasn’t gained widespread currency. Maybe now it will thanks to a new modular PC push from none other than Intel.

In a blog post last week, Intel bigged up the idea of modularity on the PC, both for desktops and laptops, though it’s the latter that’s arguably the most interesting.

Intel argues that a lack of modularity increases waste, drives up costs and makes it harder for us poor old end users to repair our computers. “In the increasingly digital world, e-waste is a growing problem. Every year, over 60+ Million tons of e-waste is generated with less than 25% collected, ” Intel says, adding that, “with low recovery and repair rates, consumer activists and environmental groups worldwide have been actively lobbying for the right-to-repair.”

The solution according to Intel is a new modular approach that supports upgrades, customisations and repairs. If it all sound familiar, that’s because Framework’s laptop adhere to very much the same philosophy. You can buy them today and they’ve been on sale since 2021.

Indeed, Framework welcomes Intel’s new platform, telling us, “Intel regularly publishes reference designs for use by notebook OEMs, including past designs that have had multi-board and modular architectures. What’s great this time is the acknowledgement that it’s not just for manufacturing optimization, but something that enables consumers to use their products for longer too.”

So, Intel properly putting its weight behind the idea would be a serious game changer. Along with making things better once you’ve bought a system, Intel says the approach could make PCs cheaper to buy in the first place.

By building PCs and laptops in particular from a relatively limited number of modular internal components, they can be made more cheaply, engineered more quickly and offered at a lower cost.

Intel is proposing a new internal modular design for laptops combining a core mainboard with additional IO modules. These boards would be built to a standardized design to ensure compatibility and future repairability and upgradability.

The idea is that if a wide range of laptops all use these boards, then they’ll be cheaper to make as the engineering and development will be easier. Upgrades and repairs will obviously benefit, too. Maybe you wouldn’t even need to go to your laptop vendor for a new mainboard.

It should be said that none of this directly addresses the holy grail of laptop upgrades, namely the GPU. That, presumably, would be integrated into the mainboard (Intel makes no mention of GPUs for the modular laptop architecture), and so the whole mainboard with CPU and GPU would probably need to be replaced.

That would represent progress of sorts over laptops with no upgrade path at all. But it doesn’t exactly sound cheap.

For the desktop, Intel envisages a module for the CPU, a little like the CPU cartridges of yesteryear, that presumably makes a CPU replacement less scary than messing with a fully exposed socket and an array of fragile pins. Intel has tried to get CPU modules going for years now, such as the Compute Element in previous years’ NUCs.

There’s also GPU module that slides on rails, plus hot-swappable M.2 modules. It does look more user friendly than a standard ATX PC, but also looks more expensive and perhaps less flexible.

Currently, for instance, the ATX standard can accommodate graphics cards across quite a range of shapes and sizes. This Intel modular platform looks a great deal more constrained. Likewise, the CPU module looks a lot more complex and expensive than a bare CPU.

Anyway, the laptop part of Intel’s modular PC push is pretty exciting. Intel says in very vague terms that it hopes to “transform the way PCs are designed.” But at this stage it has nothing specific to say about any partners it may be working with and if there are major brands with plans to adopt the architecture.

We’re hopeful but not exactly holding our breath. Watch this space.