Intel NUC 8 Mainstream Kit NUC8i5BEHS Mini Desktop PC w/ Intel i5-8260U Review

Intel NUC 8 Mainstream Kit NUC8i5BEHS Mini PC

Intel NUC 8 Mainstream Kit (NUC8i5BEHS) is a mini PC desktop for business and home use with the technical specs of Intel i5-8260U processor, 256GB PCIe Solid State Drive, 8GB DDR4 memory, Windows 10 Pro operating system and modern connectivity options including Type-C Thunderbolt 3 port, 802.11ac wireless, Bluetooth 5.0.

Intel NUC 8 first appeared at Amazon.com on December 10, 2020 and the average customer rating is 4.5 out of 5 stars by 14 users at the time of this product review. Quarter 4 of 2019 release, quad core, ultra low voltage Intel i5-8260U processor (6MB cache, 8 threads with the hyperthreading) works at the speeds between 1.6GHz and 3.9GHz with the turbo boost function. It has an average CPU PassMark benchmark score of 7789 and the typical TDP- Thermal Design Power is 15 watts.

Intel NUC 8 has the built-in Intel UHD 620 graphics card with a similar performance to the Intel HD 620 and 630 and somewhere between the dedicated NVIDIA GeForce 910M and 920M dedicated graphics cards. And with a video card benchmark score of 1050 you can play the casual, non-demanding games like Rocket League, Farming Simulator 17 and Team Fortress 2. It also comes with the Intel Iris Plus Graphics 655 as the graphics coprocessor that is on par with the dedicated NVIDIA 930M or 940MX and will let you play some of the modern games at low to medium settings and resolutions. The PassMark benchmark score is 1803 at the moment.

You’ll get a power supply of 90 watts on this mini desktop PC. 8GB DDR4 SD RAM at 2400MHz is an adequate amount at this level of processing power and computing and for daily use. And you can expect decent multitasking power to run different apps and browser tabs simultaneously without freezing or delays. You’ll get it as 2 x 4GB and the maximum amount of memory supported is 64GB on these two DIMMs. 256GB PCIe NVMe M.2 Solid State Drive is again a sufficient amount as local storage space and at a much higher speed than a regular SATA hard drive. It will be fine a good percentage of computer users without too many multimedia files to save.

You’ll get the Windows 10 Pro 64-bit operating system pre-installed on this machine with the integrated security, management and productivity functions that are not available on the Windows 10 Home version and that may save you money and time. Connectivity options include 802.11ac wireless, Bluetooth 5.0, an RJ-45 Ethernet connector for wired internet access, a USB Type-C Thunderbolt 3 port (4K UHD 60Hz supported), an HDMI 2.0 output, 4 x USB 3.1 gen 2 ports, a headphone microphone combo jack, and a microSDXC with UHS-I support. Dual monitors are supported on this PC.

Black NUC 8 Mini Desktop weighs just 1.51 pounds and measures 4.4W x 4.6L x 2H inches and you can take it wherever you go easily, to use in the hotel room etc. on your travels. It comes with the VESA mounting kit and you can mount it at the back of the screen. Please note that this is a new mini desktop PC that is upgraded from a base model and with the box opened and resealed to install the parts to offer you the specs you see on the product page. It comes with the IST Computers power cable as a bonus. You’ll get a warranty of three years for the upgraded SSD and memory from Issaquah Highlands Tech and again an original warranty of 3 years for the other components from Intel.

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