Triple-Slot GPU in a NUC? Intel “Raptor Canyon” NUC 13 Extreme at TwitchCon
The Largest NUC Extreme Yet
We are living through an era of ever more powerful (and power hungry) computer components, and on the other end of the spectrum Intel’s NUC (Next Unit of Computing) concept has been a low-power alternative for a decade now – perfect for those without the need for the fastest available hardware.
Of course, that changed a bit with the introduction of the “Ghost Canyon” NUC 9 Extreme in 2020. With the Extreme version Intel scaled the NUC family all the way up to a kit supporting dual-slot graphics cards – first with strict length limitations, and later (beginning with the “Beast Canyon” NUC 11 Extreme in 2021) with support for full-length cards like the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Founders Edition.
But how do I know the 3080 FE is properly supported in a NUC 11 Extreme? I use just such a system every day, including for the writing of this news post:
Enough rambling, as the subject of this post is supposed to be the unit that Intel showcased during TwitchCon. You can watch the replay here, but the gist is that the next NUC Extreme is significantly larger, and can support up to a triple-slot graphics card. You can also read the post over at VideoCardz.com, which offers AI-upscaled images instead of the grainy screenshots featured here.
Based on its size relative to the NUC 11 Extreme in the photo above, this new version will feature quite a large enclosure, up to the scale of a well-equipped mini-ITX system. Will the value proposition be appealing to the DIY community? Based on the feedback we received from previous NUC Extreme launches, probably not – though DIY is certainly not the target market here.
All we can do is speculate until pricing and availability are announced, and that hasn’t happened just yet. Still, it is encouraging to see that Intel is not backing away from the NUC Extreme concept, even as enthusiast CPUs and (especially) GPUs demand more power and increasing thermal dissipation characteristics.
For a much clearer look at the system, here’s the tweet from FanlessTech (embedded below):
Meet the NUC 13 Extreme (Raptor Canyon) 😱 pic.twitter.com/sg7tWbs3oa
— FanlessTech (@FanlessTech) October 10, 2022
