Intel NUC or passive build for HTCP?

[tongue_of_colicab]

Hi guys,

Okay so I've been waiting for months now for the 6th gen intel nucs to go on sale (because intel couldn't be bothered enabling HD audio pass through on the 5th gen windows drivers...).

Now I can finally get my hands on a i5 model paying only a 100 euro premium over what you'd pay in the rest of the world (thank you Japan...) but now I'm wondering if it's the right choice.

I plan on running Kodi, Emby server (for transcoding, 1 ~ 2 1080p streams at most), one or two lightweight VM's at some other background stuff that shouldn't really take up much processing power.

Noise, price and space are important for me as I plan on having the system on 24/7 and I live in a small one room apartment so it should be silent.

Intel NUC:

Pro's
- Small, can stuff it away anywhere.
- Low power.
- Decent IGP (compared to my passive system below).
- Cheaper than my other build

Con's
- Not sure how silent the fan is. Don't think you can fully turn it of and small fans = noise.
- No 3.5" HDD space so when my current disk is full I probably have to spend extra on a NAS.
- Don't think this cpu will handle much more than 1 1080p stream, might not be very future proof.
- Cheaper initial price but might end up spending more due to having to buy a NAS.

Passive PC build:

Pro's
- intel i5-6400T should be quite a bit faster than the NUC.
- Space for HDD's & PCI-E slot making it (more) future proof.
- Can be made fully passive with a passive PSU and a NoFan CR80.

Con's
- 200 ~ 300 euro higher purchasing price.
- Takes up more space (though I might be able to fit it under my bed).
- IGP is pretty weak compared to the NUC.

 

[Rodéric]

NUC should be rather silent, even with active cooling, some older NUC might be passively cooled...
I'd go NUC, because of the small form factor and because some of them have an integrated IR sensor, quite useful to remote control them... [Also take the NUC using the M2 SSD thingy, they are more compact than those using SSD or even worse HDD]

 

[tuna]

Get a Pi2 instead.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

The atom and celeron models are passive I believe but they aren't powerful enough to do transcoding.

IR receivers or 2.4ghz remotes can be bought for 10 ~ 25 euros so that's not really something I take into consideration too much. Especially since I can use my phone to control the box as well.

@tuna a pi isn't going to transcoding and run a VM or two is it?

 

[tuna]

Why would you transcode?

 

[tuna]

Of course, running a VM would not be very fast on a pi2.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

[="tuna, post: 1895688, member: 376"]Why would you transcode?[/QUOTE]

Because I want it to transcode when I'm outside using 4g and transcoding is pretty much required for the fire tv I want to use at my girlfriends place as well.

 

[tuna]

OK, so you want a media server that can serve files outside you LAN as well as a media player. I would personally go for two different devices for those two functions.

Also, is it really possible to have a quiet media server? You would need the HDDs somewhere and they will make noises.

 

[homerdog]

OK, so you want a media server that can serve files outside you LAN as well as a media player. I would personally go for two different devices for those two functions.

Also, is it really possible to have a quiet media server? You would need the HDDs somewhere and they will make noises.

I mean it's possible. Slap a couple 2TB 850 EVOs in there

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Some things to be aware of, especially in Japan.

There are quite a few issues you'd have to overcome for a fully passive system.

1. Under the bed wouldn't be a good idea unless you have active airflow under there. Heat will pool up greatly degrading the passive cooling of your system. Your bed will also become quite a bit warmer. Maybe not a problem but it was for me when I used to keep my HTPC under my bed. I have a hard time sleeping if I get too warm.

2. Electricity is expensive in Japan, so I expect you won't be keeping your apartment air conditioned when you aren't there. If it's anything like the single room apartments I've lived in while in Japan, it's going to heat up very quickly in there during the late spring, summer, and early autumn. Again greatly reducing the effectiveness of passive cooling. Not that much of an issue if it isn't doing much, but if it's transcoding things actively it may become an issue.

3. With the above in mind, you'll have to be very careful with choosing components for passive cooling. Your device is going to get quite warm. Meaning a lot of heat that the CPU and storage devices will have to deal with. HDDs especially aren't fond of prolonged high temperatures and that may greatly reduce their effective lifespan.

As to the Intel NUC, it depends on the ambient noise of the area you live in. If there's generally a lot of ambient noise (traffic, nearby businesses, etc.) you probably won't notice. If there isn't and your hearing is good, you'll definitely notice it at night if there are no other sounds in your immediate vicinity.

If I were to do this? I'd go mostly passive with an active backup. That can mean a lot of things. Like a PSU that is passive until a certain temperature/load is reach at which point it'll activate a cooling fan. Or what I do, have a case with a relative large and slow input fan (positive pressure in the case) which provides low but consistent airflow to all of the other components which are passively cooled. Choose a fan that is known to be very quiet and even undervolt it if needed.

There's also tricks you can use to allow the apartment to assist in cooling a passively cooled system. Most of the Japanese apartments will have a vent leading out of the apartment with a fan that can be turned on in the vent. You can also make some kind of ducting to force it to draw air over and through your PC, thus cooling it while also drawing air out of your apartment. It'd probably be pretty ugly though and requires you to fabricate it yourself somehow.

Regards,
SB

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

That are some good points. I didn't think about heating up the bed. Though with a 35 watt tdp and for the time being only one hdd I'm not sure it generates a noticeable amount of heat, even under load.

You are right about the heat. The electricity used by the system isn't the problem but I'm definitely not going to turn on the ac when I'm not home.

I should probably drop the passive requirements and look for something that might keep things Cool when idling but has a fan that can kick in when needed.

I'm also going to look into remote emby clients waking up the server. They should support WOL but not sure if that is going to work remotely.

If it does I'll just schedule the system to boot and shutdown when I'm usually home and have the clients wake it when needed.

A desktop would be less noisy, two big slow fans that you might turn off vs one tiny fan. I'm sensitive to fan noise so that could be an issue for me.

But I'm not sure about the value for money. The desktop would be better but it's going to cost me ~90.000 yen. If only they weren't selling the nuc6i5 for 60.000 instead of the 50.000 yen it should cost it would be a much easier choice.

90k will go a long way to upgrading my current i7 rig and turning that into a emby server. Won't be silent though.