MAY 2020 PCWorld 77any panel variants or RGB lights like before.)
Given its size, you could mistake Ghost
Canyon for a standard small-form-factor (SFF)
build. But pop it open and you’ll find a
decidedly unconventional interior.
Instead of a motherboard populated with
a CPU, CPU cooler, RAM, storage, and a
discrete GPU, you’ll instead find those parts
divided among a few primary modules. One,
of course, is the Compute Element, which
contains the CPU and its cooling, along with
slots for M.2 SSDs and RAM SODIMMs,
system ports, and the wireless connectivity
card. You pull it out as a single unit and open
it up only to install SSDs and RAM—the CPU is
soldered on.
The second (and possibly third) are youroptions, but not this NUC.
Built around Intel’s
Compute Element, it
comes apart as big,
easy-to-swap
components. When you
outgrow your processor,
you simply replace the
entire Compute Element
(go.pcworld.com/clmt)
with a more modern
version. The same applies
for the GPU, because you
can install an off-the-shelf
graphics card from the
get-go.
Yes, that’s right. This
NUC can be overhauled and upgraded like
bigger PCs, and in mere minutes.
DESIGN
To give Ghost Canyon its modular flexibility,
Intel did have to supersize it a bit. All three
flavors of this NUC—Core i5, Core i7, and
Core i9—use the same five-liter chassis.
In other words, our NUC9i9QNX review
unit towers over all of Intel’s itty-bitty PCs, past
and present. It looms like Godzilla over the
pocketable dongles and little 4 x 4-inch
square boxes. Even next to the larger Skull
Canyon and Hades Canyon models, it
remains imposing. Ghost Canyon’s only visual
tie to other NUCs is the skull graphic printed
on its two side panels. (Sadly, you won’t find
Ghost Canyon surrounded by Skull Canyon, Hades Canyon, the
Intel Compute Stick, and a Broadwell-era NUC. Don’t be fooled by
the picture—Ghost Canyon is considerably bigger than all of them,
measuring 9.37 x 8.5 x 3.78 inches (238 x 216 x 96mm).