Fri Dec 28, 2018 11:48 pm
I assume that way more memory than needed means that you use less than 24GB of the 32GB you have available. I'm pulling the 24GB out of thin air here as you might be fine using a little more memory for samples.
I wonder how many have been successful running the Intel NUC machines. In theory they should be fine, but anytime it's not conventional hardware I suppose there's the possibility of extra driver issues. Other than that it's all the usual suspects. Disable superfetch (don't just turn it off), turn off any Bluetooth, wifi, or cloud services like OneDrive. Search manufacturers web sites for the latest hardware drivers. Implement all available software updates of course. Running the hardwired keyboard and mouse as you mentioned might be helpful.
Try keeping the onboard audio running with any system sounds pointed at that device. Even with system sounds disabled I've seen programs try to access the default audio device (grrr!). If any of us had a formula that always worked for every Windows install we could get rich selling the solution. Best of luck!