Is it me or the Intel NUC7i7BNH throttles like crazy?

[TheDigitalJockey]

Hello all,

I've just ran an AIDA64 test and I'm currently getting a 100° max temperature and a 40% throttle. This is insane.

I've tried to switch the thermal paste for Kryonaut and got a little better but still far from perfect and even tried liquid metal and still no luck.

Is this bad design? Does your NUCs also throttle?

Any input would be appreciated.

[LeonWaksman]

1. You can control the cooling fan activity from Bios settings. Enter Bios setting (press F2 during boot, while you see the Intel NUC logo).
2. In Bios, open the Cooling page.
3. Set: Fan Control Mode to Custom, Primary Temperature Sensor to Processor, Fan Off Capability - uncheck/disabled, Minimum Temperature to 85, Minimum Duty Cycle to 40, Duty Cycle Increment to 6, Secondary Temperature Sensor to CPU Voltage Regulator, Minimum Temperature to 60, Minimum Duty Cycle to 40, Duty Cycle Increment to 6.
4. You may want also to disable Turbo Bust Technology in the Performance tab. This will decrease the fan fluctuation as result of CPU frequency change with very minor effect on performance.
5. Press F10 confirmed by "Y" to save settings and exit from bios.

Leon

[TheDigitalJockey]

Where did these adjusts came from? Thanks to this I was able to run a 30 minute stress test with Turbo Boost on before I could get any throttling. It’s too bad that for some weird reason it only worked for one time. After that the same test with the same settings didn’t work. Does your NUC also throttles?

[Trial-Member]

Is this bad design? Does your NUCs also throttle?

Yes and yes.

I guess the chassis of the NUCs are actually too small to control the resulting temperatures properly.

The NUCs are all about design.

The thermals are not the pros of the NUCs. Intel has known this problem for years and generations of devices. But they do not want to give up the form factor.

Even the i5 quickly gets into temperatures where the fan has to turn up significant. I have two NUC8i5BEH here, a Zotac ZBOX (also with a 4-core i5 CPU). Only the two NUCs make noise, with a few BIOS settings you can optimize the behavior a bit, but if I compare the ZBOX: The ZBOX is a bit bigger (fits on a VESA mount anyway), but quieter. This is noticeable at the NUC, because there is a constant up and down in the speed.

The quietest, but also least powerful thing I have here is a NUC6CAYS.