Intel NUC

[J]

On Tue, Jun 17, 2014 at 7:35 PM, Phil <phil_lor at bigpond.com> wrote:
> Thank you for reading this.
>
> I have a small area that I can allocate to computer use and have been
> getting by with a laptop with a smallish screen. I've just discovered the
> Intel NUC line of computers and although Intel states that they are Linux
> compatible, a google search has revealed that some users are having various
> problems. It seems that Intel have released a new BIOS upgrade that
> overcomes a boot problem.
>
> I was wondering if any list members have had any difficulties with Intel
> NUCs?

We have had quite a bit of experience with them:
http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/06/hands-on-with-canonicals-orange-box-and-a-peek-into-cloud-nirvana/

(Full Disclosure: I work for Canonical).

I've played with the Orange Boxes quite a bit, and the NUCs do have
some quirks, but to be honest, I've only ever encountered those quirks
when running a cluster of them, and even then the issues were
seemingly transient, and usually cleared up by a hard reset of the
misbehaving node.

I also have an Ivy Bridge based NUC that I use as a stand-alone
MAAS/Juju server, file server and occasionally internet surfing
machine.  It works fine, boots every time.

The only boot issue I've ever had with my personal one is that if you
plug in an external HDD, the BIOS always wants to boot from that
rather than its internal HDD.

There were/are some issues from time to time with things like remote
control via AMT but otherwise, my own experience has been relatively
trouble free.

That said, the older ones aren't good if you want to game, as the
graphics chip is fairly pedestrian, but the later versions fix that
with improved graphics chipsets.  However the newer models (Haswell
based) also do not have AMT if remote management is your thing.

The biggest issue I have with the NUC really is the cost.  My personal
NUC is an i5 Ivy Bridge with 16GB RAM and a 480GB mSATA SSD.  It cost
about $1K to build that, and I could have gotten a lot more horsepower
for the same price in a full sized machine, or perhaps could have
gotten a similar sized one with an AMD chip for cheaper, maybe, I
don't know for sure.

But all in all, the NUCs are pretty decent systems and I do enjoy
tinkering with mine.

FWIW, here's the info on the one I have:
http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/nuc/nuc-kit-dc53427hye.html

Cheers,

Jeff

>
> --
> Regards,
> Phil
>
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