3 ms·

Are you sure? I have one and the wifi definitely doesn't work out of the box and there are a couple other annoyances the worst being the machine locking up if

by pmorici 10y ago

Are you sure? I have one and the wifi definitely doesn't work out of the box and there are a couple other annoyances the worst being the machine locking up if you let it sit for too long. I haven't spent time to investigate but that isn't the definition of "works out of the box"

windexh8er 10y ago
Since there are a number of iterations of NUC I suppose you could have one that doesn't. However most of the Intel wireless chipsets are some of best supported. I own two Intel NUC and two Gigabyte Brix machines - all of them were specifically selected to run Linux and all of them work flawlessly out of the box under any major distro. One of my favorite desktop machines is the Intel Skull Canyon (NUC6i7KYK). It has an i7-6770HQ, supports 32GB of RAM (all of the newer, i.e. Skylake and greater do) and the real difference I wanted was the fact that it has two M.2 slots AND a true Thunderbolt 3 port (for support of the Razer Core external GPU enclosure). Highly recommended if you want a performant machine in a small form factor with multi-monitor support and flexibility given it's size. I only hope that Gigabyte continues to make the Brix line, especially when Ryzen drops from AMD. As much as I like the Skull Canyon I'd love to drop Intel from a pure privacy standpoint.
- peatmoss 10y ago
  > I'd love to drop Intel from a pure privacy standpoint. Are you referring to the Intel Management Engine? I was under the impression that AMD was as bad if not worse than Intel in that regard: https://libreboot.org/faq/#amd https://libreboot.org/faq/#amd Or is Ryzen expected to be better in that regard?
  - windexh8er 10y ago
    TBH I hadn't looked at AMD in that regard for quite some time since they hadn't been on my short list. Thanks for pointing this out, likely doubtful Ryzen will be any different unfortunately. sigh
    - peatmoss 10y ago
      I feel like AMD is missing an opportunity here. They aren't able to compete completely with Intel on performance now, and probably won't ever. Ryzen should be better, but I doubt they'll achieve parity with Intel. If AMD wanted to compete on something they could compete by being the chip provider that was security-friendly. The failed Talos secure workstation proved that at least some people are willing to spend lavishly on truly open, user-controlled hardware. My supposition is that there could be pretty solid demand if the price point weren't ~$10k.
devdoomari 10y ago
> the worst being the machine locking up if you let it sit for too long. uhm... look into power settings? That's common for most os.
- washadjeffmad 10y ago
  No it isn't, and you shouldn't accept that as a standard behavior.
- slrz 10y ago
  I guess "locking up" is not intended to describe the kind of lockup you can fix by entering your login password.
caleblloyd 10y ago
The Intel WiFi chips they use (I think it's 8260 on the Skylake models) is supported by recent kernels such as the one shipped with Ubuntu 16.04. They also list Linux support on their website. We have a handful of Broadwell (5th gen) and Skylake (6th gen) NUCs running at work using Ubuntu 15.10 and 16.04. Everything works great including WiFi.
rickyc091 10y ago
I've been tinkering around with it since the last two iterations. The primary reason it might not have worked out of the box is probably due to the bios not being updated to the latest version. Otherwise, I've installed Ubuntu on over a dozen of these machines for a project without any trouble. If you try to swap the SSD from one NUC box to another, you might run into some trouble though... the bootloader needs to be repaired.

by pmorici 10y ago

windexh8er 10y ago

Since there are a number of iterations of NUC I suppose you could have one that doesn't. However most of the Intel wireless chipsets are some of best supported. I own two Intel NUC and two Gigabyte Brix machines - all of them were specifically selected to run Linux and all of them work flawlessly out of the box under any major distro. One of my favorite desktop machines is the Intel Skull Canyon (NUC6i7KYK). It has an i7-6770HQ, supports 32GB of RAM (all of the newer, i.e. Skylake and greater do) and the real difference I wanted was the fact that it has two M.2 slots AND a true Thunderbolt 3 port (for support of the Razer Core external GPU enclosure). Highly recommended if you want a performant machine in a small form factor with multi-monitor support and flexibility given it's size. I only hope that Gigabyte continues to make the Brix line, especially when Ryzen drops from AMD. As much as I like the Skull Canyon I'd love to drop Intel from a pure privacy standpoint.

peatmoss 10y ago
> I'd love to drop Intel from a pure privacy standpoint. Are you referring to the Intel Management Engine? I was under the impression that AMD was as bad if not worse than Intel in that regard: https://libreboot.org/faq/#amd https://libreboot.org/faq/#amd Or is Ryzen expected to be better in that regard?
- windexh8er 10y ago
  TBH I hadn't looked at AMD in that regard for quite some time since they hadn't been on my short list. Thanks for pointing this out, likely doubtful Ryzen will be any different unfortunately. sigh
  - peatmoss 10y ago
    I feel like AMD is missing an opportunity here. They aren't able to compete completely with Intel on performance now, and probably won't ever. Ryzen should be better, but I doubt they'll achieve parity with Intel. If AMD wanted to compete on something they could compete by being the chip provider that was security-friendly. The failed Talos secure workstation proved that at least some people are willing to spend lavishly on truly open, user-controlled hardware. My supposition is that there could be pretty solid demand if the price point weren't ~$10k.

devdoomari 10y ago

> the worst being the machine locking up if you let it sit for too long. uhm... look into power settings? That's common for most os.

washadjeffmad 10y ago
No it isn't, and you shouldn't accept that as a standard behavior.
slrz 10y ago
I guess "locking up" is not intended to describe the kind of lockup you can fix by entering your login password.

caleblloyd 10y ago

The Intel WiFi chips they use (I think it's 8260 on the Skylake models) is supported by recent kernels such as the one shipped with Ubuntu 16.04. They also list Linux support on their website. We have a handful of Broadwell (5th gen) and Skylake (6th gen) NUCs running at work using Ubuntu 15.10 and 16.04. Everything works great including WiFi.

rickyc091 10y ago

I've been tinkering around with it since the last two iterations. The primary reason it might not have worked out of the box is probably due to the bios not being updated to the latest version. Otherwise, I've installed Ubuntu on over a dozen of these machines for a project without any trouble. If you try to swap the SSD from one NUC box to another, you might run into some trouble though... the bootloader needs to be repaired.