This was my second NUC, the first was a gen 6 I put to use as a NAS.  I've built towers for decades with Windows and wanted something smaller with Linux for a change.  You have to be a bit tech-savvy, and ideally have an alternate working system just in case, but the ends justified the means for a web surfing system for my wife.  System cost including 32GB RAM and 970 Evo+ PCIe NVMe was under $500 in April 2019.