A high-performance fanless PC specialist has listed NUC PCs using the latest passive cases from Akasa. Listings by AtLast! As spotted by Fanless Tech, solutions include systems built into the Akasa Turing AC Pro and Maxwell AC Pro. Both of the cases house NUC 13 Pro innards (with Intel i7-1360P & Iris Xe Graphics) and are said to deliver impressive performance under load.
Intel launched its NUC 13 Pro machines just a few weeks ago. The Raptor Lake-P powered machines were singled out for criticism in a review by The Register for having annoying buzzy fans which "came to life and blew… constantly." Noise pollution can greatly impact productivity, so Akasa's intervention(s) is welcome.
Akasa's Turing AC Pro converts a NUC 13 Pro into a somewhat Xbox Series X-alike tower. In the images above and below, you can see aspects of the design revealing the thermal considerations of the case makers.
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In brief, the Turing AC Pro tower case includes two 6mm heat pipes and a pure copper CPU block. Moreover, a substantial aluminum block is provided to keep your M.2 PCIe SSD cool, calm and collected. Systems maker AtLast! Solutions will spec up to a Samsung 990 PRO SSD. Stepping back from the system, you can also see that the chassis is a sizable heatsink with an extensively finned design. The Turing AC Pro measures 95 x 113.5 x 274 mm (W x D x H) - or 2.8 liters, and is said to cool up to 40-watt processors.
Akasa's Maxwell AC Pro is a more traditional compact NUC-style desktop design. This chassis has thicker heat pipes and a larger overall size at 218.5 x 206 x 80.3 mm (W x D x H) - or 3.6 liters but uses aluminum for the CPU block. Again, a thermal kit for the M.2 SSD is supplied, but this time it is a finned model. The maximum TDP for processors used in this case is also said to be 40 watts.
Both of the passive fanless Akasa encased NUC 13 Pros are listed at $1,070 and come packing the Intel Core i7-1360P with Iris Xe Graphics, 8 GB of DDR4-3200, and a 500 GB Samsung 980 PRO SSD. These prices are over $300 more than a NUC 13 Pro barebone sold on Amazon (same processor, but missing any RAM or storage).
