Hello, This is my post and would like to get your suggestion on replacing my existing ASUS NUC13ANHI7(64GB , 1TB SSD).I had purchased this system in late 2024 and installed Windows 11 OEM edition and VMware workstatopm pro to run 3 VM's (Ubuntu and Windows server) for learning Cybersecurity related stuffs. But the system OS crash with a "Critical System error", even without running or having VMware. I reported the issue and ASUS has replaced the Motherboard for three time, but the issue still remains. I had very tuff in making the service team to understand and finally there are ready to take back. Now,i'm wondering is it advisable to go with ASUS NUC? if yes, can you recommend the most robust model with action model no. my requirement is to run max. 3 VM's apart from that there will not be any application running in the host OS. this time i'm thinking of having Ubuntu LTS as the host OS and install linux native KVM as the hypervisor. Please suggest the exactmodel from ASUS such as NUC14 Pro or NUC15 Pro that gives robust performance. Thank you in advance.
It's likely your crashes were due to the Intel CPU - the 13th and 14th gen CPUs were notorious for their hardware bugs that cause unexpected crashes. So whichever NUC you choose, I would recommend avoiding those two CPU families.
Personally, I use a Minisforum UM780 XTX (Zen 4 7000 series CPU, 64GB DDR5, 2TB SSD, 2x 2.5GbE) and it works great with a Linux KVM host (I use CachyOS as the host). I've been using this for ~2 years and have had zero issues. Check it out on YouTube or Reddit, there are plenty of good reviews for this model, especially for homelab scenarios.
The older Intel Minisforum NUCs aren't that good, but the recent AMD ones (made in the last couple of years) have been a game changer. And the OCuLink port is also nice to have if you ever want to connect an external GPU to the NUC for whatever reason.
@d3xt3r very nice insights here! I am a huge fan of minisforum machines as well. Definitely great little boxes for home lab.
Brandon
@sakthivelrajappan, I hate that you had so many issues from the NUC13. I didn't personally test the 13, but did have my hands on the 14, but I didn't test long term either so keep that in mind. I am also a fan of Minisforum mini PCs for running home lab type servers. I think the MS-01 is a great machine for running workloads. I have been running ESXi bare metal on these boxes for 2 and a half years now with not many problems to speak of. I did wind up disabling the efficiency cores as well as this seems to help with stability. However, if you are planning on running Windows 11 bare metal, I would say you should be safe with any of the newer models, either ASUS or something else. I would probably go for the ASUS NUC 15 personally if they are going to swap this out with you. Hopefully this helps!
Brandon