At the start of the summer time, we realized that Intel’s NUC exercise had been discontinued, and {that a} non-exclusive partnership with Asus had been arrange to make sure continuity. Now, at first of September, ASUS has formally launched its NUC enterprise, providing NUC merchandise primarily based on Intel’s tenth to thirteenth technology core collection. It’s straightforward to grasp that these are precisely the identical merchandise, and that the deal between Intel and Asus was additionally meant to incorporate a share of the previous’s stock. But the deal doesn’t cease at NUCs, as a number of Intel executives have made the journey to Asus to go up the brand new Business Unit devoted to those mini-PCs.
On a day-to-day foundation, ASUS is now answerable for the distribution of NUC merchandise, and the corporate is dedicated to making sure a level of continuity for these ranges. It is probably going that Intel has transferred its work on future variations of the Meteor Lake fashions to ASUS. This might probably imply that future NUC collection will nonetheless have a 100% Intel dna, however shall be badged Asus. There may even be cohabitation with the vary of mini PCs that Asus has been growing for a while, specifically merchandise primarily based on AMD CPUs.
Finally, there’s nothing to say that Asus will observe the identical logic as Intel in gaming merchandise, the place the NUC Extreme vary was changing into more and more obscure, from our level of view. The alternative of sizes, requirements and type components is a direct consequence of the mini ITX normal, with out bringing something new to the desk.
