Intel Beast Canyon NUC Review: Desktop Tiger Lake Debuts in SFF Gaming Powerhouse
by Ganesh T S on July 29, 2021 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Systems
- Intel
- NUC
- Tiger Lake
- NUC11
- Beast Canyon
Miscellaneous Performance Metrics
This section looks at some of the other commonly used benchmarks representative of the performance of specific real-world applications.
Web Browser Benchmarks - JetStream and Speedometer
Web browser-based workloads have emerged as a major component of the typical home and business PC usage scenarios. Beginning with this review, we are including browser-focused benchmarks from the WebKit developers. Hosted at BrowserBench, JetStream 2.0 benchmarks JavaScript and WebAssembly performance, while Speedometer measures web application responsiveness. We also process MotionMark, but the confidence level of the results vary as much as +/-35%. Hence, we present graphs only the Jetstream 2.0 and Speedometer results for the three top browsers below.
In order to maintain reproducibility, we self-host the BrowserBench benchmarks (git clone of the WebKit repository as on July 1, 2021). The browser versions used for the numbers above are presented in the table included in each system's review.
| Intel NUC11BTMi9 Browser Bench | |||
| Speedometer 2.0 | JetStream 2.0 | MotionMark 1.2 | |
| Microsoft Edge (92.0.902.55) |
181 ± 2.2 | 201.313 | 900.46 ± 14.16% |
| Google Chrome (92.0.4515.107) |
212.1 ± 2.1 | 201.097 | 1115.74 ± 5.54% |
| Mozilla Firefox (90.0.2.7872) |
164 ± 2.2 | 123.612 | 1072.12 ± 3.44% |
BAPCo's SYSmark 25 and UL's PCMark benchmarks both include web browser activities as part of their evaluation scheme. However, the performance for this increasingly important workload tends to get lost in the presentation of a single number. JetStream and Speedometer help us focus on how different PC configurations vary in terms of the user experience with respect to web browsers.
3D Rendering - CINEBENCH R23
We use CINEBENCH R23 for 3D rendering evaluation. R23 provides two benchmark modes - single threaded and multi-threaded. Evaluation of different PC configurations in both supported modes provided us the following results.
The microarchitectural improvements in Tiger Lake help the Beast Canyon outscore the Ghost Canyon by a significant margin.
x265 Benchmark
Next up, we have some video encoding benchmarks using x265 v2.8. The appropriate encoder executable is chosen based on the supported CPU features. In the first case, we encode 600 1080p YUV 4:2:0 frames into a 1080p30 HEVC Main-profile compatible video stream at 1 Mbps and record the average number of frames encoded per second.
Our second test case is 1200 4K YUV 4:2:0 frames getting encoded into a 4Kp60 HEVC Main10-profile video stream at 35 Mbps. The encoding FPS is recorded.
The latest Tiger Lake microarchitecture again helps the Beast Canyon come out on top.
7-Zip
7-Zip is a very effective and efficient compression program, often beating out OpenCL accelerated commercial programs in benchmarks even while using just the CPU power. 7-Zip has a benchmarking program that provides tons of details regarding the underlying CPU's efficiency. In this subsection, we are interested in the compression and decompression rates when utilizing all the available threads for the LZMA algorithm.
Cryptography Benchmarks
Cryptography has become an indispensable part of our interaction with computing systems. Almost all modern systems have some sort of hardware-acceleration for making cryptographic operations faster and more power efficient. In this sub-section, we look at two different real-world applications that may make use of this acceleration.
BitLocker is a Windows features that encrypts entire disk volumes. While drives that offer encryption capabilities are dealt with using that feature, most legacy systems and external drives have to use the host system implementation. Windows has no direct benchmark for BitLocker. However, we cooked up a BitLocker operation sequence to determine the adeptness of the system at handling BitLocker operations. We start off with a 2.5GB RAM drive in which a 2GB VHD (virtual hard disk) is created. This VHD is then mounted, and BitLocker is enabled on the volume. Once the BitLocker encryption process gets done, BitLocker is disabled. This triggers a decryption process. The times taken to complete the encryption and decryption are recorded. This process is repeated 25 times, and the average of the last 20 iterations is graphed below.
Creation of secure archives is best done through the use of AES-256 as the encryption method while password protecting ZIP files. We re-use the benchmark mode of 7-Zip to determine the AES256-CBC encryption and decryption rates using pure software as well as AES-NI. Note that the 7-Zip benchmark uses a 48KB buffer for this purpose.
Yet another cryptography application is secure network communication. OpenSSL can take advantage of the acceleration provided by the host system to make operations faster. It also has a benchmark mode that can use varying buffer sizes. We recorded the processing rate for a 8KB buffer using the hardware-accelerated AES256-CBC-HAC-SHA1 feature.
In every cryptography application, the Tiger Lake-based Beast Canyon is the runaway leader.
Agisoft Photoscan
Agisoft PhotoScan is a commercial program that converts 2D images into 3D point maps, meshes and textures. The program designers sent us a command line version in order to evaluate the efficiency of various systems that go under our review scanner. The command line version has two benchmark modes, one using the CPU and the other using both the CPU and GPU (via OpenCL). We present the results from our evaluation using the CPU mode only. The benchmark (v1.3) takes 84 photographs and does four stages of computation:
- Stage 1: Align Photographs (capable of OpenCL acceleration)
- Stage 2: Build Point Cloud (capable of OpenCL acceleration)
- Stage 3: Build Mesh
- Stage 4: Build Textures
We record the time taken for each stage. Since various elements of the software are single threaded, and others multithreaded, it is interesting to record the effects of CPU generations, speeds, number of cores, and DRAM parameters using this software.
Dolphin Emulator
Wrapping up our application benchmark numbers is the new Dolphin Emulator (v5) benchmark mode results. This is again a test of the CPU capabilities.
Overall, the CPU capabilities of the Core i9-11900KB with its new Tiger Lake microarchitecture / increased L2+L3 cache help the Beast Canyon NUC handily outwit the other contenders across all the workloads analyzed in this section.
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Spunjji - Friday, July 30, 2021 - link
"Can I buy the new compute element card and put it in a Ghost Canyon case?"I've been wondering that - I thought part of the point of the Element was to enable that sort of upgrade, but then I guess you'd lose the PCIe 4.0 compatibility
damianrobertjones - Friday, July 30, 2021 - link
Question: Can you purchase (I believe you can) JUST the element and place it into the previous model's chassis? That's what I was led to believe with this 'supposed' upgradability. If not, then possibly avoid this machine as there won't (probably) be an upgrade path. I did own the previous gen.Question 2: What the heck is going on with the smaller Nuc 11 units? I cannot seem to buy one ANYWHERE (u.k.).
mode_13h - Monday, August 2, 2021 - link
I think Tiger Lake is simply in high-demand. Intel likely prioritizes notebook OEMs above its own NUCs. Most NUC buyers probably don't know or care about the difference between 10th gen and 11th gen, so it's less bad to undersupply that market. Of course, this is all speculation.vol.2 - Tuesday, August 3, 2021 - link
I'm assuming they use the cheapest fans they can get away with. I'm sure the noise would improve dramatically if you replaced them with some better ones.Oxford Guy - Wednesday, August 11, 2021 - link
I’m sure the laws of physics are malleable.JoeDuarte - Tuesday, August 3, 2021 - link
1. It would help to benchmark them with more realistic specs, and consistent specs across the different SFF computers you included. 16 GB of RAM is too little for something this high-end, with an 8-core i9 Tiger Lake CPU, and a new-gen Nvidia 3060 GPU. (And you had 32 GB of in the Zotac...) 512 GB of SSD is too small for this kind of build, and there are big differences in SSD performance between 512 GB units and 1 TB+ sizes. (And you have different SSD models and sizes across the tested computers, ruining the validity of the results.)2. Intel's prices are still a bummer. I love the idea of a NUC, and of these X Canyon big-NUCs, but their prices and availability have always ruled them out. It's just worth it for what you get. We have to add several hundred dollars to that $1,350 price for this model. And hundreds more for a display, keyboard, and mouse. It's easily a $2,000 build, probably more like $2,300, all before taxes.
It makes more sense to go to PCPartPicker and build out a compact PC using one of those cuboid cases. They're a lot bigger than NUCs, but much smaller than mid-towers.
3. Intel really struggles with naming and model numbers. The NUCs are a messy jumble of letters and digits. And Intel commits the sin of having multiple names for the same thing, and you have to keep track of numerous confusing terms and their relation to each other. e.g.:
-- Goldmont vs. Apollo Lake, using Skylake arch, vs. Braxton vs. Willow Trail
-- Cherryview vs. Cherry Trail vs. Airmont
-- Beast Canyon vs. Bean Canyon vs. NUC vs. NUC11BTMi9
-- NUC11BTMi9 vs NUC11DBBi9, where the former is supposed to be a computer and the latter is a "Compute Element"
Nothing about the substring BTMi9 screams "computer", and nothing about the substring DBBi9 screams "Compute Element". It's all such a mess, and it makes it hard to shop for and buy Intel's products. If you don't already know the exact model number of what you want, there's no way to know from the model numbers that you encounter what you're getting or where it fits into the larger context of NUC models. These are things that any organization should be able to fix – clean, consistent naming, and clean, concise, and non-ugly model numbers.
mode_13h - Wednesday, August 4, 2021 - link
> It makes more sense to go to PCPartPicker and> build out a compact PC using one of those cuboid cases.
Except you cannot buy a Tiger Lake-H CPU. They're only sold in BGA and mostly found in laptops.
Unlike the Gemini/Jasper/Elkhart Lake CPUs (which are also BGA and often found in Chromebooks), you probably can't buy a mITX motherboard with them pre-installed, either.
JoeDuarte - Thursday, August 12, 2021 - link
I didn't think of that, though it wouldn't matter in my case. Whenever I build out a system at PCPartPicker I choose the Core i7-11700 or one of the Zen 3 chips – I think it's called a 5600 or 5800, but I forget. I don't think Tiger Lake-H would be an improvement from those, just maybe lower power.The GPUs are decent for integrated, and that has made me lean toward Intel because of the difficulty in finding current gen discrete GPUs like the 3060 Ti, but I haven't pulled the trigger yet. The Zen 3s don't have integrated GPUs, which would leave me without a GPU unless I settled for an obsolete 1650 or something. I'd rather live with the Intel 750 for a spell until the powerhouses are available at normal prices.
mode_13h - Friday, August 13, 2021 - link
> I choose the Core i7-11700 ... I don't think Tiger Lake-H would be an improvement> from those, just maybe lower power.
There are some notable differences. The desktop 11th gen CPUs are Rocket Lake, built on Intel's 14 nm++++ process, using Cypress Cove cores. Those cores are a 14 nm back-port of Ice Lake's (launched in 2019) Sunny Cove.
The Laptop & NUC 11th gen CPUs are Tiger Lake, which use Intel's 10 nm+++ node (also called 10 nm SF). They use Willow Cove cores, which are a generation newer than Ice Lake's (and therefore Rocket Lake's). However, the generational gains of the cores were modest, with the main difference being that Tiger Lake clocks higher.
Now, if you want to compare spec-for-spec, try this:
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/compar...
The main thing that shows is that Tiger Lake-H has 50% more cache and the top-end model clocks lower. However, being a laptop chip, the top-end model also has a TDP of just 65 W. So, it's probably better to compare it with the fastest 65 W Rocket Lake:
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/compar...
According to that, Tiger Lake-H is able to offer a much better Base clock, though its turbo is still lower. That's probably because its peak power is also lower, again being a laptop chip. Furthermore, clock speeds don't tell the whole story. In the end, specs are no match for actual benchmarks:
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intels-enthusias...
These benchmarks show Rocket Lake pulling ahead in GPU tests, probably due to its faster turbo. However, when it comes to CPU-intensive tests, we see Tiger Lake hold its own.
Unfortunately, not many people seem to have run that exact comparison. Most are either comparing with the top Rocket Lake SKU or just other SFF PCs. If anyone else has benchmarks of the i9-11900KB vs. i9-11900, please share.
I guess the point is that if you care about power/noise/size, this NUC Extreme seems pretty compelling. If you're willing to spend a bit more and go for a top-of-the-line desktop, then you should probably fare better with Rocket Lake.
I wish Tiger Lake-H came in a LGA-1200 socketed version, so we could really see it stretch its legs. I'll bet it would beat even i9-11900KF by a noticeable amount.
> The Zen 3s don't have integrated GPUs
They do now! Check out the new Ryzen 5000G models!
https://www.anandtech.com/show/16824/amd-ryzen-7-5...
They're decent, for an integrated GPU, but not on par with the RTX 3060 in this NUC Extreme.
mode_13h - Wednesday, August 4, 2021 - link
> And Intel commits the sin of having multiple names for the same thing,> and you have to keep track of numerous confusing terms and their
> relation to each other. e.g.:
>
> -- Goldmont vs. Apollo Lake, using Skylake arch, vs. Braxton vs. Willow Trail
> -- Cherryview vs. Cherry Trail vs. Airmont
Goldmont is the core. Apollo Lake is the SoC. The "Mont" cores are the low-power ones. They've been very consistent about that: Silvermont, Airmont, Goldmont, Goldmont+, Tremont, and soon Gracemont.
Starting with Ice Lake, the big cores are named after coves, so far.
And the "Trail" names seem to be system designs, or something?
The one naming convention that really got out of control is the "lakes". Those seem to have very little consistent meaning. I think they have a few Lakes that aren't even CPUs/SoCs.
> Nothing about the substring BTMi9 screams "computer"
It's just a model number, dude. Just type it into a search engine and look it up. And some places I've seen will at least say it's a NUC compute element, although that requires you to know how one differs from a regular NUC.
> It's all such a mess
I will agree that Intel's product line is full of subtle variations, like NUCs with one vs. two Ethernet ports. I was staring at two Tiger Lake NUC listings, trying to figure out the difference, until I noticed that.