Over the years Intel has introduced a number of new computer form factors that either became a hit, fizzled out, or moved on to live a more quiet life. The New Unit of Computing (NUC) decidedly became a hit with so-called Mini PCs now everywhere, while the Intel Compute Stick has been largely forgotten. In a recent video by the [Action Retro] one such Compute Stick is poked at, specifically the last model released by Intel in the form of the 2016-era STK1AW32SC, featuring a quad-core Intel Atom x5-Z8330 SoC, 2 GB of RAM and 32 GB eMMC storage.
As the name suggests, this form factor is very stick-like, with a design that makes it easy to just plug it into the HDMI port of a display, making it a snap to add a computer to any TV or such without taking up a considerable amount of space. Although Intel didn’t make more of them after this model, it could be argued that devices like the Chromecast dongle follow the same general concept, and manufacturers like MeLe are still making new PCs in this form factor today.
In the video this 2016-era Compute Stick is put through its paces, wiping the Windows 10 installation that was still on it from the last time it was used, and an installation of Haiku was attempted which unfortunately failed to see the eMMC storage. Worse was the current Ubuntu, which saw its installer simply freeze up, but MX Linux saved the day, providing a very usable Linux desktop experience including the watching of YouTube content and network streaming of Steam games.
Although dissed as ‘e-waste’ by many today, if anything this video shows that these little sticks are still very capable computers in 2025.
My work office has several of those plugged in to the screens hanging around the office. A few are used as narrowcast, a few were used as presentation screens but I think these all got upgraded, and others power the screens above the IT department showing the status of stuff and call/ticket queues.
They used to crash frequently, and me being tall and having narrow wrists was the natural candidate to once a month unplug and replug them for a few screens, but those issues have gone now (they probably use an auto-reboot-every-week-script now)
“They used to crash frequently”
This was my experience with the one I had, to the point I ended up returning it after a few weeks of struggling with it. No matter what operating system I put on it (Windows 10 it came with, various Linux distros, and OpenBSD) it would either hang or reboot itself every couple of hours. In hindsight it was probably a heat issue, which is likely why Intel abandoned the form factor. With the much more powerful NUC you could just mount it on the back of a monitor or TV using the existing VESA mount holes, so the need for a stick format went away.
Just dug out an old PPT presentation I did for my company on these as a possible replacement for traditional thin clients. One of the comments was “portable hand warmer” — so I’d probably say, yea, overheating was an issue.
Also, I never did like the fact that to run Ubuntu properly one had to get their hands on the Windows version of the stick (with its uprated hardware) since the Ubuntu version’s hardware was a bit anemic.
We had maybe five of these (early model, I guess) used in similar ways and with the same problems. The last one was tossed within a year. Good on paper and from a known company, I assumed a bad batch.
Had much better luck with FitPCs from Compulab, have one in the closet, that must have been running continuously ~15 years, starting on Win7, now Win10.
I can now confirm that these sticks are still in function but they have installed smart power switches on the screens, which just all get booted up at 7:00 am and killed at 21:00 mo-fri, thus rebooting the compute sticks each day.
I bought one and the 2GB RAM, even then, was pretty pathetic. I tried to like it, but running Windows it would crash handling anything over one basic webpage. The concept was cool, and today with more RAM the idea could work much better.
I just removed Windows installed Debian 12 on mine. The 32GB of eMMC storage to me was the issue. It filled up so much. Using Linux instead of Windows would have been so much better. Now I have devices that I can grab and throw in my bag and have if I need it.
A right angle adapter would have that stick hang down properly.
They came with HDMI extenders. On some TVs (which was probably the use case for these) the HDMI cable was on the side pointing out so it would have been easy to use as is.
i was a little excited about an intel that has low enough power draw / heat dissipation that it could work in this form factor. seems like it would have to be much cooler even than the celeron n4000, which is intel’s pi-killer chip in my experience (because it runs cool so long as there’s no load). but the comments about the frequent crashes i guess end that hope. oh well :)
Alder Lake N is much better and has replaced the old series. N50, N95, N97, N100. Runs 2 or 4 “E cores”.
I have one of these. I bought it as an experiment to see how well it might work in a work scenario. Long story short, I never recommended it for the office.
More RAM and better temp control would have helped these, I think.
I have been thinking of trying to get Chrome OS Flex running on mine, but MX Linux sounds like an option as well.
The generation 2 model(STK1AW32SC) was a signifigant upgrade over the 2015 gen1 model STCK1A32WFC which used SDIO for the realtek wifi, I still have a bunch of them running digital signage(using xibo) and have bought several of the later updated models(I’ve reviewed some fanless ones from azulle I liked) I always wanted one of the m5 versions (STK2MV64CC ) they had 4gb of ram and a fancy power adapter that was also a usb-c dock. The capabilities of the current ones have absolutely exploded though, I just checked amazon and mele is shipping a fanless one with an N100 chip and 8gb/128 which at 160 feels like the sweet spot for anything these are being used for these days.
Recommendations/link for a new on pls ?
AHH I see they’re a different form factor to the compute stick. Oh well.
Unlike others, I’ve had good experience (no crashes or hangs after months to years) with an older version of the Intel computer stick. I did have to figure out how to boot without a monitor https://rightsock.blogspot.com/2020/05/intel-compute-stick-wont-boot-without.html?m=1 but I also would not recommend updating to Ubuntu 24, where the installer now freezes on you if you restrict it to 1 GB of ram.
We looked at Intel chips for embedded applications, but the licensing BS and the fact that Intel wanted an NDA before their salespeople would even talk to us, turned us off them. They were pretty clear that unless we were interested in 100k and up quantity orders, it wasn’t worth their time to even talk to us.
Just give ’em a call. Nowadays, they’re probably eager to make any sale at any cost to your terms.
Remembering why we forgot the Intel Compute stick.
They were /Awful/. 1GB or 4GB of ram and a dog slow eMMC for storage, 32GB. And less heatsink than a Chromecast with a price rivaling a good used desktop.
I could never get them to do anything useful. Even if it was within their capabilities they were very flaky and unreliable.
No legacy or PCI bus meant completely incompatible with Dos or many flavors of Linux (Bootloader was 32bit, but it would run in 64bit, so you needed a hybrid Linux boot flow that would do a switch over). If someone had whipped up an EFI module that emulated a PC it might have been cool for a DOS machine or something.
With the ARC GPU line-up Intel is finally getting the idea and using software translation for pre-DX12 support while still simplifying the hardware. Sony knew this too and had vestigial backwards compatibility.
We had several of these for single function work. One would run a browser for weather radar, one for flood cameras, one for our common operating picture. If you needed to multi task or run more than two browser tabs they bogged down quick. Overheating was an issue. We wound up putting a box fan behind the row of monitors to force airflow, which kept them from locking up but not by much. I forget what we upgraded to.
They were solid for windows based SCADA work though. We had an in house SCADA/PLC programmer that built a very simple GUI for our lights and gate arm system, controlled over VHF.
The way I see it, the stick form factor evolved into Chromecast, Roku, FireTV, etc. Just turns out expensive power hungry Intel chips aren’t much better for that role than cheaper and more efficient ARM based ones. So, Intel got left behind there, as is their current MO.
Worked for an MSP -(which btw I would never recommend anyone in tech do, just stay unemployed until something better comes along). But this MSP had a dog food plant customer that wanted a cheap-o DVR solution to monitor every IP camera on site at once via a single usb Intel- computer on a stick and what I discovered was horrible. The little computer on a stick would work for about 30mins and crash right after we would restore it and leave and for reason because they already paid for our “solution” by our fearless leader we had to support it. For some reason this manager would not back down on his stupid “DVR Solution” and I would have to fight with him dayily via TICKETS and Emails showing him the maxed IO and Net traffic specs on the Usb Computer on Stick until evidently I stole a highend Intel Nuc from our store and just threw out the usb stick. Now everytime I see those things I just remember how much computing power you actually need to run a proper DVR system. This was probably around 2016 and later that year I got a better job until that ended during COVID and my life has pretty much been a series of ups and downs since this. Honestly as much as I like raspberrypis, NUCs and micro controllers I personally they are just a waste of time and more trouble then they are worth.
There’s a Ubuntu respin script that handles the 32/64 bit problem on these from Linuxium. That was a weird intentional problem (my personal opinion) with the Intel Bay Trail architecture.
But rumor has it that Fedora will do it out the box. You’re probably better off with that since Linuxium doesn’t appear to be well organized if it’s still maintained.
This is one of the very few devices that has literally been thrown (across the room) into the donation bin for someone else to lose their mind with, though I did include the box. It certainly put some good ideas out there as others have said (Chromecast/Roku etc.) but for a “working” computer rather than media center…no.
My Stick died with a blinking LED after a bad Firmware-Update.
Since that it doesn’t work anymore:(
I still have a pile of 2014 hdmi sticks with some Android on there, last time I booted one I could not even make the Google Play store working, as Google killed it for old android versions (that’s why we need new laws for companies killing old software like they do, and generating lots of e-waste).
My goal is to try to put some new software with docker-proot on there:
https://github.com/mtseet/proot-docker
It’d be really cool if this thing supported mSATA drives and was pushed as a standardized motherboard formfactor for laptops/tablets/phones, that may also be used as a desktop.
I actually liked a couple of the models of the stick PCs. No idea why you would want to run linux on it when win10 ran fine but whatever. The main problem with these were the cpu. The intel atom was one of the most anemic, bottlenecking, limpwristed, unenthusiastichandjob processors I have ever come into contact with. No idea what I will ever do with em but have a box of these and og chromecasts holding up other boxes of junk I guess, so they are decent in a support role such as that lol. As per youtube usual it is done with their best one, so anyone finding one that is not the breakneck last gen model will not find a similar experience lol. Kudos. If you want to watch something try to boot linux for 15 mins like it is 1998 they provide that critical nostalgic realism of temporality ;)
I was an IT Director for a school district and we deployed hundreds of these NUC Compute Sticks, the updated ones with the i3 processors. They were used as a cheaper alternative to compute modules for our interactive displays. The teachers needed Windows and we had a custom firmware image, a custom OS bundle of Win 11 LTSC, and some braided wire security cables and they worked flawlessly. Only had to replace a handful over a 5 year time frame.