#ESXi #Intel #NUC #Pro #Wall #Street #Canyon
Many in the VMware Community, including myself, started with the classic 4×4 Intel NUC for running a VMware homelab. Over the years, this powerful little Intel NUC continues to enable a wide variety of new VMware use cases from running vSphere, vSAN, NSX, Tanzu and even vRealize (now Aria). It felt like it was just yesterday that I had switched from using an Apple Mac Mini to the latest Intel NUC (6th Generation) to build my new vSphere/vSAN Homelab, which was more than 6 years ago! 😲
While Intel continues to expand and grow their “NUC” portfolio to include many other form factors, the classic 4×4 design still has a special place for many people in the VMware community. The classic Intel NUC is not only small, portable but also extremely capable, especially with last few releases which makes this an ideal kit for those just getting started with a new VMware Homelab.
If you are in the market for an upgrade this year, definitely check out the latest refresh of this classic 4×4 design with Intel’s recent launch of the Intel NUC 12 Pro, formally known as the Wall Street Canyon NUC.
Let’s take a closer look at this new Intel NUC 😀
Compute
There are five different CPU configurations to select from across Intel Core i7, i5 and i3 processors, two of which include support for Intel vPro.
- Intel 12th Generation Intel® Core i7-1270P (vPro)
- 12 Processor Cores (4P+8E), 16 threads, 18MB Intel® Smart Cache, 35W TDP
- P-Cores: 4.8GHz Turbo; E-Cores : 3.5GHz Turbo
- Intel 12th Generation Intel® Core i7-1260P
- 12 Processor Cores (4P+8E), 16 threads, 18MB Intel® Smart Cache, 35W TDP
- P-Cores: 4.8GHz Turbo; E-Cores: 3.4GHz Turbo
- Intel 12th Generation Intel® Core i5-1250P (vPro)
- 12 Processor Cores (4P+8E), 16 threads, 12MB Intel® Smart Cache, 35W TDP
- P-Cores: 4.4GHz Turbo; E-Cores: 1 3.3GHz Turbo
- Intel 12th Generation Intel® Core i5-1250P
- 12 Processor Cores (4P+8E), 16 threads, 12MB Intel® Smart Cache, 35W TDP
- P-Cores: 4.4GHz Turbo; E-Cores: 3.3GHz Turbo
- Intel 12th Generation Intel® Core i3-1220P
- 10 Processor Cores (2P+8E), 12 threads, 12MB Intel® Smart Cache, 20W TDP
- P-Cores: 4.4GHz Turbo; E-Cores: 3.3GHz Turbo
Similar to the Intel NUC 11 Pro, the Intel NUC 12 Pro will also include a “Slim” K or “Tall” H chassis option and the latter providing a secondary onboard network interface and two additional USB ports. All kits support up to 64GB SO-DIMM (DDR4-3200) similiar to previous Intel NUC generations.
For a more detailed breakdown across the various Intel NUC 12 Pro kits, please refer to the product brief.
Network
The built-in onboard network interface includes an Intel i225 (2.5GbE) which is similiar to previous Intel NUC models and is automatically recognized when using ESXi 8.0 or using the Community Networking Driver for ESXi Fling for those that wish to run earlier ESXi 7.0 versions.
For those interested in the Tall chassis option, you also have the ability to add a secondary Intel I225 (2.5GbE) expansion module that includes two additional USB ports. Again, ESXi 8.0 will automatically recognize the network adapter or you can use the Community Networking Driver for ESXi Fling if you plan to run ESXi 7.0.
If you need even more networking, you can take advantage of the two Thunderbolt 4 ports using these Thunderbolt 10GbE solutions for ESXi or look at USB-based networking by using the popular USB Network Native Driver for ESXi Fling.
Storage
There is support for 1 x M.2 PCIe x4 Gen 4 (2280) and 1 x M.2 SATA (2242) for the Slim chassis option. For those interested in vSAN, I recommend looking at the vendor KingShark, which has a compatible M.2 SATA (2242) which I have shared in a previous blog post using their 256GB SATA SSD. Historically, the Slim chassis only supported a single M.2 NVMe and now with an extra 2242 slot, you can run vSAN while still getting the benefit of the Slim chassis option.
For those interested in the Tall chassis option, you also have the ability to add an additional 2.5″ SATA SSD on the back of the chassis lid, which will future proof your investment since you will now have up to three storage devices, one of which can be used to install the ESXi OSDATA. Although ESXi can be installed from USB, this option has been deprecated and will be removed post-ESXi 8.0, so something to really consider. See this blog post for additional considerations for vSphere 8.
If you need more storage or performant external storage options, you can also use the two Thunderbolt 4 ports and add these Thunderbolt M.2 NVMe solutions for ESXi which will give you plenty more storage capacity.
ESXi
The latest release of ESXi 7.0 Update 3 installs on the Intel NUC 12 Pro without any issues, but it will require the use of the Community Networking Driver for ESXi Fling to recognize the onboard network devices. For those interested in running ESXi 8.0, no additional drivers are required as the Community Networking Driver for ESXi has been productized as part of the ESXi 8.0 release.
The following ESXi kernel option cpuUniformityHardCheckPanic=FALSE (SHIFT+O during boot up or manually add it to the boot.cfg when creating your ESXi bootable installer) is still needed to boot ESXi with processors that contain both P-Cores and E-Cores or you will see a PSOD with following message “Fatal CPU mismatch on feature“.
Note: Once ESXi has been successfully installed, you can permanently set the kernel option by running the following ESXCLI command: localcli system settings kernel set -s cpuUniformityHardCheckPanic -v FALSE before rebooting or you can reboot host and take out the USB and manually edit EFI\boot\boot.cfg and append the kernel option.
