Intel NUC10i7FNH Frost Canyon Review: Hexa-Core NUC Delivers a Mixed Bag
by Ganesh T S on March 2, 2020 9:00 AM ESTPower Consumption and Thermal Performance
The power consumption at the wall was measured with a 4K display being driven through the HDMI port. In the graphs below, we compare the idle and load power of the Intel NUC10i7FNH (Frost Canyon) with other low power PCs evaluated before. For load power consumption, we ran the AIDA64 System Stability Test with various stress components, and noted the maximum sustained power consumption at the wall.
The usage of a PCIe 3.0 x2 NVMe SSD along with a low TDP processor (25W, compared to the 28W+ processors in the other systems, other than the June Canyon NUC) manufactured in a highly-optimized and power-efficient 14nm process result in the Frost Canyon NUC having a sub-5W idle power consumption even while driving a 4K display. The system is able to sustain 90W+ at the wall for a very brief duration only, with the power falling slightly south of 60W for sustained workloads.
Our thermal stress routine starts with the system at idle, followed by four stages of different system loading profiles using the AIDA64 System Stability Test (each of 30 minutes duration). In the first stage, we stress the CPU, caches and RAM. In the second stage, we add the GPU to the above list. In the third stage, we stress the GPU standalone. In the final stage, we stress all the system components (including the disks). Beyond this, we leave the unit idle in order to determine how quickly the various temperatures in the system can come back to normal idling range. The various clocks, temperatures and power consumption numbers for the system during the above routine are presented in the graphs below.
| Intel NUC10i7FNH (Frost Canyon) System Loading with the AIDA64 System Stability Test | |||
The frequencies adjust to ensure that the 30W PL1 is maintained. With just the CPU loaded, the cores can maintain around 3 GHz sustained. Adding the GPU brings the CPU cores down to 2 GHz. With only the GPU stressed, the CPU cores can stay close to their boost clocks without consuming much power. The thermal design is quite good, with the package temperature never above 90C for extended durations.
| Intel NUC10i7FNH (Frost Canyon) System Loading with Prime95 and Furmark | |||
Our custom stress test with Prime95 and Furmark shows similar characteristics. Frequencies get adjusted to maintain a 30W package power, and the package temperature does not cross 85C. Furmark loads the GPU more than the AIDA stress component, and hence, we see the CPU frequency drop down to around 1.5 GHz in this case.
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The_Assimilator - Monday, March 2, 2020 - link
It's not, but the point is still valid: nobody buying these things is doing so because they expect them to be graphics powerhouses.HStewart - Monday, March 2, 2020 - link
But some people are so naive and don't realize the point. I came up in days when your purchase card that didn't even have GPU's on it. Not sure what level iGPU's are but they surely can run business graphics fine and even games a couple of years ago.notb - Thursday, March 5, 2020 - link
Horrible?These iGPUs can drive 3 screens with maybe 1-2W power draw. Show me another GPU that can do this.
This is an integrated GPU made for efficient 2D graphics. There's very little potential to make it any better.
PaulHoule - Monday, March 2, 2020 - link
Well, Intel's horrible iGPUs forced Microsoft to walk back the graphical complexity of Windows XP. They kept the GPU dependent architecture, but had to downgrade to "worse than cell phone" visual quality because Intel kneecaped the graphics performance of the x86 platform. (Maybe you could get something better, but developers can't expect you to have it)HStewart - Monday, March 2, 2020 - link
I think we need actual proof on these bias statements. I think there is big difference of running a screen at 27 or more inches than 6 to 8 inches no matter what the resolution.Korguz - Monday, March 2, 2020 - link
we need proof of your bias statements, but yet, you very rarely provide any.. point is ??Samus - Monday, March 2, 2020 - link
What does screen size have to do with anything? Intel can't make an iGPU that can drive a 4K panel fluidly, meanwhile mainstream Qualcomm SoC's have GPU performance able to drive 4K panels using a watt of power.HStewart - Tuesday, March 3, 2020 - link
Can Qualcomm actually drive say a 32 in 4k screen efficiently. Also what is being measure here, Videos or actually games and that depends on how they are written.erple2 - Saturday, March 14, 2020 - link
I'm not sure that I understand your statement here, as it doesn't seem to make any sense. I was not aware that they physical dimensions of the screen mattered at all to the GPU, apart from how many pixels it has to individually manage/draw. If your implication is the complexity and quantity of information that can be made significant on a 32" screen is different from a 5.7" screen, then I suppose you can make that argument. However, I have to make guesses as to what you meant for this to come to that conclusion.Generally the graphical load to display 4k resolution is independent of whether the actual screen is 6" or 100". Unless I'm mistaken?
PeachNCream - Monday, March 2, 2020 - link
For once, I agree with HStewart (feels like I've been shot into the Twilight Zone to even type that). To the point though, Windows XP was released in 2001. Phones in that time period were still using black and white LCD displays. Intel's graphics processors in that time period were the Intel Extreme series built into the motherboard chipset (where they would remain until around 2010, after the release of WIndows 7). Sure those video processors are slow compared to modern cell phones, but nothing a phone could do when XP was in development was anything close to what a bottom-feeder graphics processor could handle. I mean crap, Doom ran (poorly) on a 386 with minimal video hardware and that was in the early 1990s whereas phones eight years later still didn't have color screens.