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Slated to arrive later in Q3 this year, the updated Haswell-based NUCs (Core i5 and i3) not only improves on its processor and graphics prowess, but also addresses practical concerns about its connectivity options (onboard audio and more USB 3.0 ports) and chassis choices.

Examples of plastic and aluminium chassis for the NUC (including a passive cooling solution on the far right)

Like its Ivy Bridge predecessors, the new generation of NUCs retains its dual mPCIe/SATA slots and SODIMM DDR3 slots. The new motherboard design even incorporates a SATA connector to support a regular hard drive when used in larger custom enclosures.

A 15W ultrabook-class 1-chip Haswell SoC should provide more compute capabilities than the previous generation, HD 5000 graphics and lower average power usage.