While I haven’t received my Skylake i5 NUC yet, a couple of readers of the blog have already got theirs. Frederik here and TheWombat here have kindly reported their Skylake i5 NUC benchmark results using the same benchmark tools that I use in my reviews. Thanks a lot guys!
EDIT: I’ve received the i5 NUC and there’s a more comprehensive review online now.
3DMark
TheWombat reported the following results:
- Fire Strike 1.1: 1360
- Sky Diver 1.0: 5387
- Cloud Gate 1.1: 7388
- Ice Storm 1.2: 82982
Having a look at how this compares with the other NUCs, we can see that the i5 Skylake NUC beats every other NUC by a good margin! The results are 30-47% better than the i3 model, no doubt due to the more advanced GPU. In this bench mark the new i5 model leaves the previous i7 model clearly behind.
Cinebench R15
In Cinebench R15 OpenGL test the dominance of the new Skylake i5 NUC continues. The results are more than 50% better than the number 2 NUC in this test – the Skylake i3 NUC.
The CPU tests measures pure CPU power and leaves the GPU out of the picture. Here we see that the Broadwell i7 still beats the new i5 by about 20% and that the Skylake i5 in turn is about 20% faster than the i3 model.
Conclusion
The NUC6i5SYH and NUC6i5SYK models really pack some serious punch. According to these initial benchmark results this is easily the best NUC for someone looking to do some gaming or other GPU intensive tasks. Other than the CPU/GPU the unit is identical with the i3 model, so if you’re interested in the other characteristics of the unit, have a look at my review of the Skylake i3 NUC. I’ll post a more thorough review of the i5 when I get the unit in my hands and definitely I’m going to try out some games as well.
If you’re interested in getting an Intel i5 Skylake NUC have a look at the Amazon price for a similarly configured NUC as TheWombat used for the benchmark results above. Alternatively, you can visit our NUC Guru, who can recommend you good compatible parts for your i5 NUC build.
