Intel's Haswell NUC: D54250WYK UCFF PC Review
by Ganesh T S on January 3, 2014 4:25 PM ESTMiscellaneous Factors and Concluding Remarks
Power Consumption:
We have already carried some graphs and tables with power consumption numbers for various scenarios in the preceding sections. The two graphs below compare idle and full load power consumption numbers across different low power desktops that we have evaluated before.
The Haswell NUC turns in stellar numbers for both scenarios. There is no doubt that this is a powerful, yet power-efficient, computing solution.
Thermal Performance:
The D54250WYK has an active cooling solution, but the size of the chassis is still a bit of a concern when it comes to cooling efficiency. To check the thermal performance of the kit, we let Prime 95 fully load up the CPU for 15 minutes, followed by the addition of Furmark to fully load the GPU also for the next 15 minutes. After this, the unit was left to idle while driving the display. Screenshots of the temperatures of various components (as reported by CPUID Hardware Monitor PRO) recorded at 15 minute intervals are presented in the gallery below.
At full CPU load, the temperatures of the cores reach 74 C, the fan spins at 3958 rpm (can go up to 4192 rpm) and the temperatures around the SSD (on the other side of the board) reach 43 C. With the GPU also fully loaded, the temperatures of the cores go down to around 67 C, the fan takes a little break at 3846 rpm. On the SSD side, the temperatures go a little further down to 41 C. After idling for 15 minutes after full loading, the cores are at 32 C, the fan is at 3206 rpm and the temperature on the SSD side goes down to 33 C. There is nothing to complain about with respect to the thermal solution except for the few notes about the fan noise that were made in the introduction.
Final Words:
From the HTPC perspective, it is troubling that HDMI audio still needs careful configuration in XBMC 12.3. For bitstreaming to work, XBMC has to be configured with WASAPI and not Direct Sound. The symptoms are the same as the Netflix HD audio issue. It is also a pity that interlaced VC-1 DXVA decoding doesn't work in XBMC. These are issues faced by the average consumer. We didn't touch upon the HDMI full range problem which HTPC enthusiasts treat as primary issue. All in all, it looks like Intel's graphics drivers still need to resolve lots of issues. While we have seen stellar progress over the last couple of years, it only leaves consumers asking for more to completely move away from discrete GPUs for HTPCs.
Moving away from the HTPC area, the NUC's low power consumption as well as small footprint enhance its appeal for use as thin clients or even full blown PCs for average office / home desktop use. The traditional desktop is being re-imagined in multiple ways with the advent of the touchscreen AiOs and form factors such as the NUC and the BRIX. The comparatively low cost and flexibility provided by the latter has ensured that the NUC form factor is here to stay as yet another excellent computing platform option for consumers.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
107 Comments
View All Comments
fluxtatic - Sunday, January 5, 2014 - link
Yeah, but isn't having options grand? In your theoretical example, I'm now paying for a bunch of stuff I don't use - battery, screen, kb, etc. Assuming I want strictly something to plug into the TV and shove into a cabinet.For me, I'm seriously considering a NUC for when I replace my wife's PC next summer. There's currently a mid-ATX tower on the coffee table in my living room, and I'm definitely going smaller next time around. Now it's just a question of how small I can go for the money it will cost.
To be honest, though, the discussion would be very nearly settled if there were Mini-ITX options for AMD FM2 processors. Haswell's nice, but I don't know that I can bring myself to pay Intel prices when the time comes.
Gigaplex - Sunday, January 5, 2014 - link
If the laptop is cheaper then you're not really paying for the screen etc. You're getting a discount with the caveat that those extras that you don't want are bolted on.darwinosx - Saturday, January 4, 2014 - link
Interesting but I'll wait for the Haswell Mac Mini.Lundmark - Saturday, January 4, 2014 - link
I thought about that too. Who knows for how long we have to wait, though? The Mac mini was neglected for almost three years before the current design replaced it.TheinsanegamerN - Saturday, January 4, 2014 - link
2014: mac mini with core i7 4750hq and iris pro.LuckyKnight - Sunday, January 5, 2014 - link
I've had one of these since they came out in the UK and it's a very good as a dedicated streaming device running XBMC on Linux. You can set the minimal fan speed to 20% in the BIOS and it runs practically silent. If it needs to ramp up (say when playing a game on a emulator then it can).The only bad thing is the cost of the unit (with mSSD, RAM).
airi - Sunday, January 5, 2014 - link
Yes, please look into writing Linux articles and integrating Linux into hardware reviews.Aikouka - Monday, January 6, 2014 - link
I have i3 Haswell NUC, and it's a pretty good unit all-around. I'm currently waiting for a good fanless third-party case, because while the NUC is fairly quiet, it's still audible in a quiet room. The fan's noise is also a little whiny, which I am not a fan of. There are announcements for fanless options that will provide 2.5" drive options as well, which could be good for creating a network-based DVR.As for the inability to bitstream, I have that exact same problem, and it's rather bewildering. My NUC was fine as I could bitstream without any problems in PLEX (WASAPI is the only option for bitstreaming in PLEX). As you can guess based on my choice in verb tense, I have the problem now, but it's strange how it appeared. Everything was fine until I loaded up a TV stream (networked from an InfiniTV 6 ETH) in WMC7, and I noticed that I wasn't getting any sound. Now, I can no longer bitstream in PLEX. I also cannot bitstream on my i3-3225-based HTPC either. I've also had this problem on an i7 860 + GTX 660 Ti system as well, but that went away with a graphics driver upgrade.
Anyway, you can get a temporary fix on the problem by setting your speaker configuration up in Windows, and telling your front-end (XBMC, PLEX, etc.) that your receiver is not Dolby Digital- and DTS-compatible. So, now my AVR just says "MULTI-CH IN" all the time as it's just getting a PCM stream from the PC.
ganeshts - Monday, January 6, 2014 - link
There is no problem with the bitstreaming from MPC-HC or any of the other media players which support that... It is only within XBMC in DirectSound mode and Netflix app.That said, I was able to bitstream successfully even from OpenELEC (which means users don't have to pay the Windows tax to make a very capable media streamer, except when Blu-ray menus are needed)
alpha754293 - Monday, January 6, 2014 - link
I wonder how this would compare - say to a Mac Mini. It seems that if the price difference between the two systems isn't more than $100-150 - why would I want to go with something like this vs. a Mac mini? (not to be an Apple fanboy or anything - but moreso for a complete pro/con analysis of each solution/type of solution in order to determine which is better in terms of technical specifications, performance, etc...)