The Intel NUC6i5SYK Skylake UCFF PC Review
by Ganesh T S on March 11, 2016 8:00 AM ESTPerformance Metrics - I
The Intel NUC6i5SYK was evaluated using our standard test suite for low power desktops / industrial PCs. Not all benchmarks were processed on all the machines due to updates in our testing procedures. Therefore, the list of PCs in each graph might not be the same.
Futuremark PCMark 8
PCMark 8 provides various usage scenarios (home, creative and work) and offers ways to benchmark both baseline (CPU-only) as well as OpenCL accelerated (CPU + GPU) performance. We benchmarked select PCs for the OpenCL accelerated performance in all three usage scenarios. These scores are heavily influenced by the CPU in the system. The benchmark numbers show that it is a toss-up between the Broadwell-U Iris Core i7-5557U in the NUC5i7RYH and the Core i5-6260U in the NUC6i5SYK. The former is a 28W TDP part and can sustain higher clocks. Despite that, the performance of the two are comparable for day-to-day usage activities (such as web browsing and spreadsheet editing), as tested by PCMark 8.
Miscellaneous Futuremark Benchmarks
The Futuremark GPU benchmarks present a different story. The advancements in the Skylake GPU enable the Skylake NUC to easily outscore every other mini-PC that has been evaluated before.
3D Rendering - CINEBENCH R15
We have moved on from R11.5 to R15 for 3D rendering evaluation. CINEBENCH R15 provides three benchmark modes - OpenGL, single threaded and multi-threaded. Evaluation of select PCs in all three modes provided us the following results. In the single threaded case, the higher clocks and TDP ratings help the NUC5i7RYH (based on the 28W TDP Core i7-5557U), ECS LIVA One (based on the 35W TDP Core i3-6100T) and the GIGABYTE GB-BXi7H-5500 (based on the Core i7-5500U - usual TDP of 15W configured upwards to 28W) to outscore the Skylake NUC (based on the 15W TDP Core i5-6260U).
However, in the OpenGL case, the Skylake GPU with eDRAM enables the NUC6i5SYK to have a comfortable lead over other UCFF PCs.
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ganeshts - Friday, March 11, 2016 - link
Hmm.. I haven't seen anyone use 'til now'.But, 'till date' is definitely common where I grew up / learned English: http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/146767/... ; It might not be the best thing to use in other parts of the world, but it is not wrong.
kmo12345 - Saturday, March 12, 2016 - link
I noticed this as well.I also disagree with your statement that it is not wrong. I don't doubt that it has entered common usage in Indian English but I have never heard or seen this phrase in the UK, North America, or even Latin America. So while it may be correct in Indian English it is incorrect in any other forms of English.
nivedita - Sunday, March 13, 2016 - link
The dictionary disagrees with you.http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/en...
gietrzy - Friday, March 11, 2016 - link
Can you please point me to Intel white papers pdf where they say m.2 in Skylake can do more than 1600 MB/s?Tia.
ganeshts - Friday, March 11, 2016 - link
Sunrise Point-LP has PCIe 3.0 lanes, and the M.2 slot uses four of them. All I can say is that, with the appropriate M.2 SSD, you can utilize four PCIe 3.0 lanes' bandwidth.jdogi74 - Saturday, March 12, 2016 - link
Sorry, but you sound like a politician. Isn't there some contact at Intel that can provide some reasoning and confirmation for this limit or has Anandtech lost all of it's industry clout?jdogi74 - Saturday, March 12, 2016 - link
I completely agree. It's a shame that this review did not address this issue. Really, it's the only thing I came to this review hoping to learn. I have seen reports from users indicating that the M.2 on these is, for some reason, capped at 1600MB/s.This review states... "full support for PCIe 3.0 x4 M.2 SSDs"... yet there's obviously some other factor that prevents these units from getting the most out of it. Given that, I would expect a review on this site to cover it and at least investigate and explain this limitation so that the readers get a better understanding of when PCIe 3.0 x4 really is PCIe 3.0 x4 and when it's not.
Can anyone explain why this alleged PCIe 3.0 x4 essentially perfoms as if it were PCIE 2.0 x4 or PCIe 3.0 x2.
Really.
jdogi74 - Saturday, March 12, 2016 - link
Sorry, I should also mention that Intel's own specs on these also confirm this 1600MB/s limit. So we know it's there. I just want to understand how it's PCIe 3.0 x4 but then it isn't.ganeshts - Sunday, March 13, 2016 - link
I benchmarked both the SM951 and 950 PRO NVMe SSDs, and the best-case bandwidth (large sequential reads) is around 1710 MBps for both.I have asked my Intel contact for the reason behind this, and I will either update things in this comments thread, or have a separate pipeline piece (depending on the depth of Intel's reply).
TheinsanegamerN - Friday, March 11, 2016 - link
Does this NUC have the ability to up te TDP, like haswell iris NUCs could (going from 15 to 28 watt, allowing both higher boost clocks and longer periods of sustained clock speeds.)?And has intel said anything about the skull canyon NUC, with the GT4e GPU?