> nobody really seems to talk about how repairable enterprise laptops are

Thinkpads have been a meme since the early 2010s.

It's funny to bring up the T480/s as positive example because I remember people complaining about anything past ~xx20 series.

> caught everyone's attention with the fun DIY repair angle

Framework is a reaction to the cult following a lot of the business laptops had. When people are spending $$ to retrofit modern mainboards to vintage Thinkpad chassis you know there's enthusiast money to be made there.

It was Lenovo ditching the classic ThinkPad 7 row keyboard with the Ivy Bridge models c. 2012 that really pissed people off