It’s also the exact purpose of my home mac mini
There are a lot of users who need many other peripherals besides keyboard and mouse and who prefer to not use a ton of dongles. Sometimes no dongle can help with a laptop, because the aggregate throughput of all its USB ports is just too small.
A NUC is much faster than a generic laptop which uses the same CPU, because it has much better cooling. In all recent 0.5 L NUCs the CPU can dissipate 35 W forever without overheating.
No generic laptop can do that. There are plenty of gaming laptops or mobile workstations that can match or exceed the speed of a NUC, but those cost between two and eight times more than a NUC, so a NUC or a similar SFF computer is a much better value than such a laptop and even together with a portable monitor and a compact keyboard it is easier to carry in a backpack than a big and heavy laptop. I have done this for years.
The Mini seems more specialized. I’ve bought many of them over the years for things like video installations, but I never see them in “regular people use”.
For quite some years I just said "buy a notebook and (if you really need it) monitor with keyboard/ mouse".
With an SSD and a decent amount of RAM any notebook is fine for 95% of what people want from the home computer, with a small exception of gaming with a better settings than low/middle.
At this point nor Mini, nor any other SFF 'desktop' doesn't make sense, because you can't take it with you if you need.
I think there are lots of reasons to prefer a minipc to laptop. Personally if I need a computer on the go, I use my phone. Much lighter and smaller.
I’ll probably go with a gaming desktop or a NUC sized machine and a gaming console depending on what the market looks like in a couple years.
Sure there are some shenanigans for some laptops, like refusing to power on with the lid closed, but 'uncluttered desk' is not a problem.
On the other hand, a NUC together with a 17" portable monitor and a compact keyboard weighs less than a 17" gaming computer or mobile workstation and it is easier carried in a backpack, while offering similar performance and more peripheral ports, eliminating the need to also carry dongles.
When you know that a monitor and a keyboard are available at the destination, e.g. when commuting between home and office, than carrying only the NUC is far more convenient than carrying even the thinnest and lightest laptop.
So you can always take a NUC with you wherever you need. I have done this in many business trips, as a much better alternative to carrying a big and heavy mobile workstation laptop.
My notebook has three USB ports. In the last years the only thing I needed (but in the end didn't) was an Ethernet adapter for the POTP (Plain Old Twisted Pair, lol) cable.
> e.g. when commuting between home and office
Quite weird take. Sure, it's small, but...
> So you can always take a NUC with you wherever you need
Well, I prefer to be able to work on my PC, not seeking a power outlets and a place for a monitor.
- big screen
- simple setup
- lasts 10 years
They're a fantastic value if you want a trouble free PC for non-tech folks. The only sad thing is that after 10 years you are basically throwing away a perfectly fine display.
Is there data on how well they actually sell? I always vaguely assumed it was a pretty low-volume product that they couldn't actually get rid of due to niche customer applications. They've historically often been very slow to _update_ it; they definitely don't treat it as one of their more important products.
The Mac mini has always been Apple's low-cost trojan horse product for existing PC users who already have a keyboard, mouse and display. The issues with keeping it updated in the past had more to do with the Intel processors available to Apple.
In the short Apple Silicon era, the Mac mini has been upgraded multiple times. It's remains an important product.
I would make a bet that the MacBook Air outsells both the iMac and Mac mini by a ratio of 10 to 1.
Check out all the big computer manufacturers like Dell and HP. Go to their “cheap desktops” section (e.g., Dell Inspiron).
Focusing on Dell, the cheapest one I see is $499 and the specs are a 13th gen i5, Intel UHD 730, 8GB of RAM, 512GB SSD. Bring your own monitor!
For laptops, the Inspiron 15 for $430 gets you 12GB RAM, 512GB SSD, 11th gen core i5, Iris Xe graphics.
Why am I buying that desktop instead of the laptop? What is my motivation?
Look at Apple and the Mac mini will save you $400 over a MacBook Air but you’ll need a keyboard, mouse, monitor, and webcam/microphone.
In the case of Apple, the desktop is literally louder because the only Apple system with a fanless design is the MacBook Air, and you get a minimal performance advantage for having a desktop because all Apple’s chips are based on the processor inside your iPhone.
Desktops just don’t have a price advantage because nobody wants them, so there’s no economy of scale.
Yes, that's who the Mac mini is primarily targeted at--PC users that want a Mac but don't want to spend a lot of money and who have a keyboard, mouse and display.
> In the case of Apple, the desktop is literally louder because the only Apple system with a fanless design is the MacBook Air…
It takes a lot to actually get any Apple Silicon Mac with a fan to make enough sound to actually be heard. If you read the reviews for the Mac mini, nobody has ever said fan noise was an issue because they never heard any.
> and you get a minimal performance advantage for having a desktop because all Apple’s chips are based on the processor inside your iPhone.
Also not accurate.
Because desktops have more room, you can get more cores (both CPU and GPU) and run them faster (and therefore hotter) than you can in a laptop. The fact the M-series chips came from the iPhone's A-series has nothing to do with performance. A $499 M2 Mac mini has 4 performance CPU cores and 8 GPU cores while a $1,199 iPhone 14 Pro Max has 2 performance CPU cores and 5 GPU cores. That's the beauty of ARM: it scales from phones to laptops to servers.
If you need more storage, you can get 8 TB in a Mac mini, while the MacBook Air maxes out at 2 TB.
The Mac mini has always been the workhorse of the Mac line and hasn't changed. Just going from Intel to ARM made the Mac mini a no-brainer replacement for the old Intel Mac Pros, which were the poster children for loud desktop computers.
I don't think the Mac mini is the workhorse or a strong seller of the Mac lineup; it's just a convenient little niche to keep around.
Regarding performance advantage: When Apple was on Intel, Intel's SKUs had way more of a wattage/thermal difference between their product lines: The 16" MacBook Pro was sucking down 100 watts while my current 14" MacBook Pro can stay charged on an iPhone charging brick.
So when you look at a Mac Mini at $600 having a handful of extra cores over a $1000 MacBook Air, it's like, "yes, it's technically faster," but not "I'm going to be able to enable new workflows with this additional performance."
If you can play a game or edit a video or browse the web on a Mac mini, you'll be able to do the exact same thing on a MacBook Air and, as a generally subjective human, not notice any difference in capability or speed. This was not the case when Apple was selling 12" MacBooks that felt miserably slow editing a Word document new out of the box.
Regarding storage: That 8TB upgrade is only available on the top-tier Mac mini, and choosing it brings you to $3699. Choose the lowest tier MacBook Pro 14" with that same storage upgrade and for $4399 and you get the exact same processor with the exact same performance (not thermally limited), and on top of that you get a 120Hz mini-LED high DPI display, keyboard, trackpad, webcam, battery, and all the convenience that a laptop gets you.
What person with nearly $4000 to spend on a system is going to choose not to have a laptop for less than 20% more money when they don't even lose even a single digit percent of performance? It's not like the Mac mini is internally expandable or upgradable at all.
"The Mac Mini remains a product in our lineup" was the phrase that stuck into everyone's mind on how Apple views it.
How do you know this? I personally decided against a mini when I specced one out and a MBP wound up cheaper. The pricing strategy certainly made me _feel_ like they were pushing me away from the mini.
overall I feel that there is enough integration density in processors that the laptop form factors will be good enough for most common (& semi advanced) uses. so this seems like an odd decision to move out of that market (technically) but if you factor in business then it starts to makes sense.
Also, apple’s crazy profitability means they may offer something like the mini that doesn’t sell as well as their laptop, while intel is ruthlessly cutting out things that aren’t part of their core business because of their monetary issues.
If Intel can’t compete with cheaper manufacturers and its not hitting their internal required rate of return then it may no longer justify having that business unit at all.
Besides, I'd use an external display anyways, not working at caffées.
I haven’t owned a laptop in years. I travel with my iPad pro.
1. https://www.bee-link.com/beelink-gaming-pc-gtr6900hx-1994384...
The only worries are the quality of the cooling and the noise.
According to this review:
https://www.servethehome.com/beelink-gtr7-changes-the-mini-p...
it seems that from the point of view of the cooling and noise they are significantly improved over earlier Beelink models, so any of the two variants seems like a good choice.
An alternative is Minisforum UM790, which is configured for a lower CPU power and which has slightly less peripheral interfaces.
Your mileage may vary, but I’ve been happy enough with mine for the price that I had already decided I would be choosing Beelink for my next mini PC over a NUC.
That said, I have seen some mixed reports of some issues around thermal throttling and eGPU support for some of the newer gaming focused ones, but I think if you have realistic expectations given the form factor (and especially if you’re not going for gaming) then they are fairly reliable and sturdy little devices.
* Also note, I bought mine barebones and added my own ram and SSD. I can’t speak to the quality of what they ship with, but I also haven’t heard any complaints from others with that regard.
Everyone has loved them. I wound up getting one to manage my print farm, and no complaints there, either. Knock on wood, but they Just Work, so far. Noise and heat have not been an issue, even with the oldest units.
ETA Prime and ServeTheHome do regular reviews of these on YouTube.
definitely not
Those "poshy" people are quick to click on in-app purchases.
I bought a quad i5 nuc on sale off Newegg for $300. I also ordered parts to build a little AMD 6 core APU itx setup for 50 bucks more. If the Nuc wasn't on sale I would not have bothered to even look at it. And for 50 bucks more got waaaaay more compute power. The only reason I even bought the Nuc and not another itx was simply the very small size.
The hardkernel odroid h3 with a quad Celeron, dual 2.5 GbE and m.2 M key costs $130 without the case/PSU. Intel can do better on pricing.
Lots of products here: https://liliputing.com/tag/mini-pc/
The issue is, Intel's aiming more upmarket (based on their pricing) for something that doesn't offer a lot more. Intel's done interesting/fun things, such as building the entire motherboard into a single slot sized unit, but going out and buying a Beelink is a better proposition for most people.
If anything, I think Intel can exit this market because they succeeded. They lead the way, they begat a new form factor, and it's won. But the market has grown much more competitive, and it's hard to see what Intel would do to remain relevant & important in this market. Their current efforts are interesting, and even good, but not really enough to clearly differentiate, not enough to command a huge lead in this market, and certainly not at the somewhat above average prices Intel has been asking.
This follows a lot of other Intel examples. Intel left DRAM market in 1985. Intel left SSDs in 2020, in a similar situation to NUCs here: they basically created the mass consumer market, by pioneering NVMe & creating amazingly high-value products that used to be ultra-expensive proprietary botique items.
This seems like a classic Innovator's Dilemna situation, of Intel having a strong hand creating mass-market products that define the industry, but then being chased out by down-market competition, once the offerings really become a true everyday commodity. I'm not sure if there even is another way Intel ought to behave here.
They lead the creation of a market but failed to maintain any competitive edge in it. That's a story of initial success that ultimately ran through their fingers, like so many other examples you've presented. Calling this fully "a success" seems very generous.
> If anything, I think Intel can exit this market because they succeeded.
You could spin the entire unit off so it could compete on it's own terms. There's plenty of success stories to be found this way, and Intel's habit of doing this time after time means that I have very little confidence in any new product they bring to market outside of CPU cores and view them mostly as a consumer electronics company now.
The thing you're missing is that they sell the chips inside the product. I think the idea is that it goes like this:
Intel: Hey everyone, we made this chip we think could be really cool in a new form factor.
OEMs: Uum, I dunno -- if that's such a cool thing, why isn't anyone else making them?
Intel: OK, I'll just make one myself. <makes NUC>
OEMs: Oh hey, people do seem to really like those NUCs. <makes things like a NUC with Intel chips>
Intel: There we go, you get the idea! <stops making NUC>
I don't know this is what happened, but at least it's a plausible definition of "success".
It's a mobile chipset. They're already making those. Other manufacturers also make those. A good hint here is these devices use bog standard 19V laptop power supplies.
The NUC form factor more or less already existed in the fanless industrial mini PC and HTPC markets. Intel just made it a high performance consumer product, but they also could have moved in on that industrial space and offered a solid product with good support into a space where only the Raspberry Pi and some very small scale and niche distributors exist.
They really need a products division that is outside of their core chip division. The management styles don't translate, and again, all this does is risk damaging that brand to claim a phyrric victory over a flash in the pan.
Plus.. I hate cheap plastic PCs from builders that offer zero support or longevity in their products. Intel would have had me buying fanless NUCs for years if they stayed in the space. The price difference was _well worth it_ for me.
The new high end application for PCs is running AIs locally.
No way you can fit a 4090 in a NUC, the GPU itself is larger than a NUC, heat dissipation requirements cannot be 'optimized' away.
The business market is still figuring out the balance between lightweight machines using the cloud and beefy desktops running locally.
Serve the Home has an entire series on small systems:
I only need iGPUs for a zippy UI, because I don't game on my work devices, and don't want to have any added noise because of a dGPU.
This might be the right move for Intel, but not for users. NUCs are awesome, cost-effective devices.