Raptor Lake-P on the Leading Edge

ASRock Industrial has been a major player in the Ultra Compact Form Factor (UCFF) PC space for the last few years. They have successfully released 4″x4″ systems based on the latest AMD and Intel platforms ahead of other vendors. The company’s NUC(S) BOX-1300 series launched to coincide with his January introduction of Intel’s Raptor Lake-P. The NUCS BOX-1360P/D4 broadly inherits the same board components and DDR4 support as the previous generation (NUC BOX-1200 series) products and was launched in early February.

The NUC BOX-13xxP/D5 series was introduced in January, but it took several quarters to hit retail stores. The system supports DDR5 SODIMM and uses Hayden Bridge Retimer on the Thunderbolt 4 port to enable USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 support on his Type-C port on the front panel.

Our review of the NUCS BOX-1360P/D4 has already revealed the performance advantages of the Raptor Lake-P over the previous generation -P series products. Our Arena Canyon NUC review also took a closer look at the Raptor Lake P. Both systems he used DDR4-3200 SODIMMs. Does DDR5 make a difference in Raptor Lake-P performance compared to DDR4? In this review, we take a comprehensive look at the NUC BOX-1360P/D5 and attempt to answer that question with the processor’s various power limits. increase.

Introduction and product impressions

Intel’s Raptor Lake-P is an evolution of Alder Lake-P with a more efficient manufacturing process. A heterogeneous computing architecture with a mix of performance and efficiency cores is maintained. Desktop Raptor Lake has improved performance core cache sizes and more efficiency cores compared to desktop Alder Lake. However, all of the improvements in the -P series are due to updated VF curves. Higher turbo clocks provide better performance and power efficiency within the same nominal TDP as Alder Lake-P. Raptor Lake-P also includes an additional he Thunderbolt 4 port and USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 support, depending on the adoption of specific board components.

ASRock is a well-known vendor in the consumer motherboard and mini PC market. The company established his ASRock Industrial business unit in 2011 to focus on industrial motherboards. The division was founded by him in 2018 as an independent vendor specializing in B2B products. The company offers products for deployment in small and medium businesses (offices), automation, robotics, security, and other industrial/IoT applications. As a company mainly focused on his B2B, he focuses on developing and selling motherboards to various system integrators who can provide unique added value. The company also sells mini PCs based on the motherboards it developed to retail channels. We have so far taken a closer look at the performance profiles of various ASRock industrial UCFF PCs such as the NUC BOX-1260P based on the Core i7-1260P Alder Lake-P processor and the NUC BOX-1360P/D4 based on Core. I came. i7-1360P Raptor Lake-P processor.

The company tells us NUC Box-1360P/D5 months ago. This is his first Intel-based UCFF PC that supports DDR5. Unlike the NUCS BOX-1360P/D4 slim version which does not support 2.5 inch drives, the NUC BOX-1360P/D5 returns to the I/O and chassis design found in the NUC BOX-1200 series. User can utilize his 2.5 inch SATA drive bay. , dual LAN capability, and display output options for both HDMI and DisplayPort. The main differences from NUCS BOX-1360P/D4 are summarized below.

• Replacing DDR4-3200 SODIMM slots with DDR5-4800 SODIMM slots
• Additional 2.5 GbE RJ-45 port
• Replaces an HDMI 2.0a port with a full size DisplayPort 1.4a port.
• Supports USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 (20 Gbps) on both Type-C ports
• Hayden Bridge retimer on Thunderbolt 4 port (compare with Burnside Bridge on NUCS BOX-1360P/D4)

ASRock Industrial delivers the NUC BOX-1360P/D5 in a nondescript box (no model inside the package). Along with the body, the company includes a 120W (19V @ 6.32A) adapter with his VESA mount with screws, M.2 mounting screws, a quick guide to assembling the system, and a region-specific power cord. increase.

ASRock Industrial sells mini PCs in barebones configurations leaving the choice of RAM and SSD to the end user. Installing these components requires removing his four screws from the underside of the unit, inserting the SODIMM into the slot, and screwing the M.2 SSD in place. Like previous products in the NUC BOX series, the screw slots for the M.2 2280 SSD are on separate plastic tabs. The sides of the chassis are perforated for air intake, and the back has vents that allow laptop-style blower fans to exhaust air past the heat spreaders. Photos of the chassis and board can be found in the gallery below.

The barebones version of NUC BOX-1360P/D5 requires DDR5-4800 SODIMM and M.2 SSD or 2.5″ SATA drive to complete the build. Two G.Skill RipJaws DDR5-4800 SODIMMs and a 500 GB Samsung SSD 980 PRO M.2 2280 NVMe SSD.

Windows 11 Enterprise 21H2 with the latest updates was installed before continuing the performance evaluation. Like other UCFF PCs from ASRock Industrial, the NUC BOX-1360P also allows you to set the CPU working mode to “Normal” (default) or “Performance”. The latter setting always sets the fan to full speed, but has the advantage that the processor has a higher PL1 limit for her (40W vs. 28W). The full specifications of the review sample for both modes are shown in the table below.

In the next section, we continue our detailed platform analysis by looking at various BIOS options.