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MagyarIntel NUC 13 Pro Kit - Vivid Canyon review: The last Intel NUC has a new case and a Core i7-1360P
The Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit is the direct successor to the Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit. Technically seen, both models are pretty similar, as the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit which we are testing also features an Intel Core i7-1360P with 32 GB DDR4 RAM and a 512-GB SSD. Visually, lots has changed as Intel has now given its final NUC release a complete makeover. As already announced, Intel will not further market its NUC devices after this release.
This means we have in our hands what is presumably Intel's last mini PC from this range. For years now, these tiny computing geniuses have been known for delivering excellent performance while keeping emissions low. The boom of mini PCs within the past year has, of course, led to an influx of manufacturers bringing similar devices onto the market. We have previously tested quite a few of these. Its rivals (mostly being shipped in to us from the Far East) were oftentimes able to compete and at the same time, they sometimes turned out to be better value for money as well. In this review, the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit will again have to compete with the devices from Minisforum, Geekom and Morefine. You can find a list of all of these devices in the following overview.
Possible competitors compared
Rating | Date | Model | Weight | Height | Best Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 82.5 % | 08/2023 | Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit i7-1360P, Iris Xe G7 96EUs | 558 g | 37 mm | |
| 85.1 % | 01/2023 | Minisforum Neptune Series NAD9 i9-12900H, Iris Xe G7 96EUs | 1.2 kg | 66 mm | |
| 85.5 % | 03/2023 | Morefine M600, 6900HX R9 6900HX, Radeon 680M | 779 g | 40.6 mm | |
| 82.8 % | 07/2023 | Geekom AS 6, R9 6900HX R9 6900HX, Radeon 680M | 753 g | 58 mm | |
| 82.3 % | 05/2023 | Geekom Mini IT12 i7-1260P, Iris Xe G7 96EUs | 572 g | 45.6 mm | |
| 80.8 % | 04/2023 | Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit NUC13ANK i7-1360P, Iris Xe G7 96EUs | 538 g | 37 mm | |
| 78.9 % | 11/2022 | Intel NUC 12 Pro Kit NUC12WSKi7 i7-1260P, Iris Xe G7 96EUs | 511 g | 37 mm | |
| 78.8 % | 08/2023 | Khadas Mind i7-1360P, Iris Xe G7 96EUs | 438 g | 20 mm |
Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit - Vivid Canyon in detail
Case - Metal instead of plastic
Finally, Intel has dared to take the step of installing the hardware into a metal case. The old plastic one can now be left in the past. The new design feels modern, fresh and on every level it impresses - right down to how high-quality the device feels to touch. At the same time, nothing has changed about the PC's dimensions. With a size of 11.7 x 11.2 centimetres, the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit still counts as one of the most compact mini PCs which can still offer extremely good performance levels.
Color-wise, Intel has been a little braver with the NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit - it is now a combination of silver and white. The white part is on the front, which is also still made from a plastic covering. Even so, the total concept feels great and Intel has continued to deliver the perfect build quality which we are used to. Unfortunately, the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit doesn't have a VESA mount.
Connectivity
Intel has stayed true to its connectivity options, giving the NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit the same external ports as the Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit. These connections are spread out along the front and back of the device. In total, it features six USB ports of which two support Thunderbolt 4 - this can widen the PC's range of uses massively with the help of suitable accessories. Monitors can be directly connected via HMDI or Thunderbolt - plus, it also has a 2.5G network connection.
Communication
The Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit - Vivid Canyon is fitted with an in-house Wi-Fi 6E AX211 module. This also supports the 6-GHz frequency band. All devices delivered fast transmission rates in our WLAN test without any real errors. The same can be said for our test sample, although it fell a little behind during the 6 GHz frequency band measurements. We used our ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AXE11000 as a test router for this test.
Accessories
The scope of delivery is kept to just the bare minimum. Aside from the device itself, Intel has only included a 120-watt power supply.
Maintenance
Despite its new case design, the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit continues to be super easy to open up. Just four screws hold on the bottom plate. After removing these, you can easily access the RAM and SSD. This is important, as the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit is sold as a barebone system. Our test system is almost fully equipped, as you can see really well. Only one further storage device can be installed. You do have to pay attention to the connection, as aside from the already installed NVMe M.2 SSD, the second M.2 slot only supports M.2 SSDs with SATA speeds and up to a length of 42 millimetres.
Performance - A modern SoC with 12 cores and 16 threads
Testing conditions
We performed all performance tests using the energy profile "Balanced". Alternative energy profiles were not available on our system. We did not change the SoC's performance and instead left it in auto mode according to the BIOS settings.
Processor
The PC's Intel Core i7-1360P is a very modern and frugal SoC from Intel's current Raptor Lake P series. The manufacturer hasn't limited the device's possible power consumption, meaning it has access to up to 64 watts for a short burst of time. This value was reached, although under continuous load, it only had access to 40 watts. In our test, we saw that this value was also kept to over a longer period of time.
The Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit mastered our test course with flying colors and it even managed to come slightly ahead of the Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit. Subjectively, there is no noticeable difference between how well both individual systems perform.
For further comparisons and benchmarks, take a look at our CPU comparison table.
* ... smaller is better
AIDA64: FP32 Ray-Trace | FPU Julia | CPU SHA3 | CPU Queen | FPU SinJulia | FPU Mandel | CPU AES | CPU ZLib | FP64 Ray-Trace | CPU PhotoWorxx
Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit - Arena Canyon vs. Cinebench R15 Multi Loop
The Cinebench R15 continuous loop gives us a first glance at how well the installed cooling unit works. The device's CPU performance already dropped by about 10 per cent after the first run. After the second run, the SoC showed relatively stable performance which achieved an average of 1,753 points after 50 runs. This is slightly less than we documented on the Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit.
System performance
During the synthetic benchmarks, the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit's system performance couldn't quite keep up with its CPU performance results. Our test sample ended up only achieving average results and during PCMark10, it was about on the same level as the Intel NUC 12 Pro Kit and the Geekom Mini IT12. Crossmark didn't yield any better results. During the RAM tests, our test sample also had to admit defeat on many occasions. In order to properly shine, the NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit should really have been fitted with faster DDR5 RAM. The manufacturer should also have done this so the PC could properly differentiate itself from the Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit. The Khadas Mind shows us what can be achieved with faster RAM.
| AIDA64 / Memory Copy | |
| Khadas Mind | |
| Geekom AS 6, R9 6900HX | |
| Morefine M600, 6900HX | |
| Minisforum Neptune Series NAD9 | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit NUC13ANK | |
| Geekom Mini IT12 | |
| Intel NUC 12 Pro Kit NUC12WSKi7 | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit | |
| Average of class Mini PC (6481 - 70620, n=77, last 2 years) | |
| AIDA64 / Memory Read | |
| Khadas Mind | |
| Geekom AS 6, R9 6900HX | |
| Morefine M600, 6900HX | |
| Minisforum Neptune Series NAD9 | |
| Geekom Mini IT12 | |
| Intel NUC 12 Pro Kit NUC12WSKi7 | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit NUC13ANK | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit | |
| Average of class Mini PC (6914 - 71285, n=77, last 2 years) | |
| AIDA64 / Memory Write | |
| Khadas Mind | |
| Morefine M600, 6900HX | |
| Geekom AS 6, R9 6900HX | |
| Minisforum Neptune Series NAD9 | |
| Geekom Mini IT12 | |
| Intel NUC 12 Pro Kit NUC12WSKi7 | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit NUC13ANK | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit | |
| Average of class Mini PC (6862 - 87358, n=77, last 2 years) | |
| AIDA64 / Memory Latency | |
| Minisforum Neptune Series NAD9 | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit NUC13ANK | |
| Intel NUC 12 Pro Kit NUC12WSKi7 | |
| Morefine M600, 6900HX | |
| Khadas Mind | |
| Geekom AS 6, R9 6900HX | |
| Average of class Mini PC (55.3 - 146, n=77, last 2 years) | |
| Geekom Mini IT12 | |
* ... smaller is better
DPC latency
We didn't note increased latencies when simply browsing the internet. These only became apparent after we started playing the 4K test video. These latencies didn't increase any further after Prime95 was started.
| DPC Latencies / LatencyMon - interrupt to process latency (max), Web, Youtube, Prime95 | |
| Geekom AS 6, R9 6900HX | |
| Morefine M600, 6900HX | |
| Minisforum Neptune Series NAD9 | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit NUC13ANK | |
| Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit | |
| Geekom Mini IT12 | |
| Khadas Mind | |
| Intel NUC 12 Pro Kit NUC12WSKi7 | |
* ... smaller is better
Storage devices
Our test sample of the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit is fitted with a 512-GB NVMe SSD from Samsung. An identical model could already be seen in the Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit. Due to the same storage device being used, we noted almost identical benchmark results when it came to performance. We only noted a difference when it came to read rates under continuous load. Here, the Intel NUC 13 Pro Kit generally delivered better performance, although the Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit never had any issues while keeping performance levels stable. The Intel NUC 13 Pro Desk Edition Kit can be fitted with two storage devices in total. It has to be noted that the second slot can only be fitted with an M.2 SSD 2242. In addition, this connection only supports SATA speeds, which you also have to keep in mind.
For further comparisons and benchmarks, take a look at our comparison table.
