[pr0xZen]

Will this NUC 2820 be able to do hardware decoding on audio (dts?) i dont have a receiver and my tv doesnt support dts.
I plan on running ubuntu or openelec.

Hardware decoding of audio codecs is only needed on very low power platforms like the Raspberry Pi or one of the android boxes, for an x86 Intel or AMD processor software decode of something like DTS by the CPU is trivial and adds next to no overhead. So all that needs to be done to get sound out where the receiver or tv doesn't support DTS is set XBMC to software decode to PCM, in Gotham this will be done with the default settings.

Be noted: If you connect to you receiver by S/PDIF (optical or coaxial digital) then you will be limited to 2ch PCM (Multichannel will be downmixed). The transfer protocol doesn't have the bandwidth to do more. The exceptions are DD (AC3) and DTS bitstreams, as these are compressed.

I'm really undecided, this nuc attract me for the low price and consuption, but I'm not convinced of performance.
I don't want to buy it and discover that i cannot play without any problem what I'm actually playing with popcorn hour A200 (i have only 1080p mkv and some bluray not compressed).

Actually i already have an intel nuc D54250WYKH that I'm using as office computer, and I'm really happy with it's performance but it cost about 3 time this. I undecided between the 2820 nuc and the i3 dn4010 nuc, but if with the celeron version i could play the same things has the i3 version i prefer to safe 100/150€ or more.

Any help to make a decision?

If you check the bottom of the previous page, I tested a 4k clip under Windows 8.1 pro with this nuc, no issues with playback (please see the notes about bandwidth in that post). In overall usage, I'd say its way snappier than my i3 (3rd gen) ultrabook.
http://e-nautia.com/vanden/disk?p=2148840

You convinced me to save money and buy this.

Windows 8 instead of Openelec will impact on performance? I would like to install a complete OS like Windows in this way i can have more flexibility, but only if it doesn't impact so much on movie playback performance.

See reply above. Running Windows 8.1 pro (120GB Kingston SSDNow V300 SSD drive, 4gb crucial ram). XBMC Gotham, 220314 nightly. Boot times are also very decent - ~10-12 seconds if autologin and boot to XBMC as shell (does not load the windows shell), or ~25 seconds to XBMC home screen if booting to windows explorer shell (loads the windows explorer shell and background programs before launching xbmc).