[mythtv-users] Warning: Do not get Kaby Lake NUC boxes

[Justin Moore]

I recently got a NUC7i3BNK for my basement, to go with two other older NUCs
in my house. These older NUCs have worked well as MythTV frontends, and are
running v29 with no issues.

The NUC7i3BNK has been a dumpster fire, though.

1) HD Audio pass-through is a known issue, although posts on the Intel
community board seemed to indicate that this has been solved. It has not.

2) Neither the BIOS nor dmidecode will tell you the current version of the
HDMI firmware. You need to install and run the updater in order to figure
out if you need to run the updater.

3) If you want to update the HDMI firmware, to test and see if it fixes
your problem, you need to
a) Put a FULL INSTALL of Win10 on your system (see:
https://communities.intel.com/thread/113959 comment 4). The Windows rescue
disc won't work, and will just give you "this application is not compatible
with this version of Windows", even though the installer is for 64-bit
Win10 and the rescue image is from 64-bit Win10; and
b) Connect an HDMI 2.0-compatible device.
[ Got that? A firmware update requires a full install of Windows 10 and
that you go buy an HDMI 2.0 device. ]

4) Even after the HDMI firmware update, a number of HD audio codecs won't
pass through.
See the same thread, further down:
https://communities.intel.com/message/475807#475807

This may be fixed eventually, but even in 2018 Intel struggles with modern
concepts like "OS-agnostic firmware updater" and "surround sound".

(Even after this rant I will be *thrilled* if someone pops up and says "No,
you idiot, you're wrong, here's how you get it to work ...")

-justin, serving as a warning to others ...
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