nuc

I have been using a Macbook Pro 2015 since 2016. It is equipped with 8G of memory, and with a 2.3GHz Intel i5 dual-core processor.

Nowadays, it’s a bit out of date. Although it runs a bit slow, and the battery has also decayed, but it is still good for me when I do some lightweight tasks such as write PHP or front-end code.

Since October last year, My company started a new project which using Java and Microservice architecture (by spring family).

It means I need to run a series of spring boot applications on my machine. You know, Java is known as resource intensive. Runs these spring boot applications on my computer is a disaster.

When the application started one by one, the fan spin crazily, the temperature of the computer start to soar. It is very hot! At the same time, the computer became extremely slow, like the sloth of the movie Zootopia

sloth

Because of the intolerable performance, I apply a Windows PC for work for a couple of months.

Yes, Apple has published the new Macbook with the M1 chip. There are two reasons I don’t buy it now:

  • At first, waiting to see the power of M1, the compatibility of softwares.
  • Now, waiting for the new Macbook with M2 chip :) In Chinese, we have a proverb: People who wait for the next version of product will always win!

Months ago, I have watched a video about how to install Hackintosh on Intel Nuc. Nuc is a series of barebone computers released by Intel. As a barebone computer, you need to buy hard driver and memory by yourself. It is small but powerful, and most important, it is easy to install the macOS system, and much cheaper than Mac mini.

The most convenient machine to install macOS is Nuc8, with the Network interface controller dismantled from MacBook, the machine can run a perfect macOS system.

I find some people who sell the Nuc on the Internet which already weld the Network interface controller from MacBook and installed the latest version of macOS. I bought one from Taobao(the biggest online store in China, like eBay or Amazon). So I don’t need to install macOS by myself (I have tried this some years ago, It’s a little bit difficult for me). I selected a Nuc8 i5beh with 16G memory and 512G SSD, only spent 3100 RMB, is much cheaper than a Mac mini.

Its performance equal with the Mac mini 2018. After using it for a month, I’m very satisfied with it. It’s more powerful than my MacBook Pro 2015.

When I start up all the spring boot applications, however, sometimes it is a little bit slow but is much more fluent than the old one. I have a keyboard and mouse in both home and company, so I can just take this machine go to work and back home every day.

It is small and lightweight, so it can easy to put in my knapsack. I buy another power adapter for it, thus I just need to carry the machine, even don’t need to bring the power adapter. The machine without the power adapter is only about 600g weight, very portable.

The only shortage of this machine is the voice of the fan is too loud. In the daytime, at my company, it is fine. But at night, at home, once I opened the IDEA, the voice of the fan is cannot be ignored.

As a computer I temporarily used while I’m waiting for the MacBook with the M2 chip, it is good enough for me, especially it is much cheap.