Intel Crimson Canyon NUC complete specs and release date unveiled

Unlike most previous NUC solutions from Intel, the Crimson Canyon mini PCs are semi-barebone models that come with soldered RAM and included HDDs. (Source: SimplyNUC)

The Crimson Canyon NUCs are meant for users who do not really intend to upgrade their systems, as the RAM is soldered and there is already an HDD included. Users may still choose among 4 or 8 GB of LPDDR4-2666, however, there is only one CPU option - the 10 nm Core i3-8121U. Also included is the Radeon 540 GPU and users can add more NVMe storage.

by Bogdan Solca, 2018/08/08

Back in April, Intel announced the Crimson Lake NUC mini PCs that combine Cannon Lake CPUs with AMD GPUs. According to online retailer SimplyNUC, there will be an entry-level model and a more advanced variant, but both are powered by Intel’s 10 nm Core i3-8121U ULV CPU and the AMD RADEON 540 GPU.

The entry-level model is codenamed NUC8i3CYSN and will get 4 GB LPDDR4-2666 of RAM, 1 TB HDD storage and a Windows 10 Home license, while the more advanced NUC8i3CYSM will get 8 GB of RAM. The ULV CPU has max 15 W TDP so it can only go up to 3.2 GHz in boost mode and integrates two cores that support hyperthreading. The only downside for these two models seems to be the fact that the RAM is not upgradeable at all, so users are stuck with either 4 GB or 8 GB.

On the GPU side, the Radeon 540 comes with 8 compute units, 512 stream processors and 2 GB GDDR5 VRAM, but it cannot really compete with the Radeon Vega M GPUs from featured in the Hades Canyon NUCs. However, SimplyNUC claims that these GPUs are still a decent solution for graphics and video editing, apart from managing medium settings 1080p on not-so-demanding games.

Other specs for the two models include:
•   M.2 2242/2280 PCIe NVMe slot
•   4K resolution support and 7.1 channel audio via HDMI
•   WiFi + Bluetooth 5.0
•   4x USB 3.0 ports, 2x HDMI 2.0a outputs, audio out jack, GbE jack
•   SD card reader
•   4.6″ x 4.4″ x 2″ dimensions, 90W external power supply

Pre-orders are already up for the US$575 NUC8i3CYSM model, and this one should begin shipping in mid-September. The NUC8i3CYSN model is expected to be available in October for US$530.