exp0devel

I think all manufacturers are pretty much same when it comes to software and customer support. And there is a room for improvement and competition. I will go with whatever manufacturer figures it out first and does it right. My rant is specifically about ROG brand since it is supposed to be user friendly and premium for the price people are paying. At current state of hardware issues in the industry I can't vouch for PC gaming being 'easy' and 'accessible'. Honestly thing that made PCMR really glorious are slowly fading away and it is sad.

I bought ASUS ROG X470-F Gaming motherboard for my high-end 2700x Ryzen build. It works pretty well but I figured several frustrating issues with it after 5 months of usage that I would like to share with community here. This is a high-end ROG motherboard and I expected quality for the money. Apparently this is not the case with ROG brand anymore. There are hardware and software issues with this motherboard and it is nearly impossible to reasonably explain it to anyone on the Asus team.
 
1) Support team responds according to their standard answer sheet and is not helpful at all. And trying to post anything on official ROG forums is a tough quest. User is required first to PM some dude on the forum in order to get your profile verified to be able to post. I did. I never got verified. Just being able to find his profile and message button took me some time.
 
2 No proper VBE (VESA BIOS Extensions) support. This is especially annoying with ultrawide setups. Latest motherboard BIOS still does not have proper VBE support and will not properly detect your GPU until after OS boots up. Meaning that every time you boot it looks like your OS is having seizures because of re-scaling. And forget about nice looking smooth boot loaders like Clover. I dual boot Ubuntu and Windows. And this frustrates me every time I have to watch my PC boot.
 
3) RAM OC is unreliable. I am not very well experienced with this, however sometimes mobo fails to boot with XMP profile enabled,  and motherboards leds indicating RAM failure.  Boots up after few restarts, sometimes resetting all the settings back to defaults. RAM sticks are ok. Tested with AsRock motherboard.
 
4) Terrible ASUS software. System monitoring and control.
 
Asus AI Suite is terrible and there is no SpeedFan support for this motherboard and only option you are left with is purchasing Argus Monitor. Software that comes with the motherboard is terrible. Other than ASUS AI Suite not being able to properly install itself (sometimes some of the utilities are missing even tho I use same installation package and tick same options) it is also caused my PC to crash. I get BSODs with latest AI Suite for my motherboard. Downloading newer AI Suite for higher tier mobo fixes this particular issues but comes with other problems like not being able to take full control over your fan speeds. 
 
Advertised AI Quick Charge just doesn't work. I've tried multiple different versions. It just sits there in your trays with disconnected icon over it. Other people reported this on the internet. But ASUS just doesn't care. You bought the product already.
 
ASUS Aura has major security issues and has been used by cheaters to execute malicious code in games. Any game using EAC (pretty much every Unreal Engine 4 game) will not launch unless you manually kill LigthingControl process from task manager. According to EAC team, Asus have been informed about the issue and have done nothing.
 
Some rant.
Idk why business still insist on using proprietary software solutions for motherboard software. It gets outdated very quickly, they never fix the bugs and/or listen to the community feedback. And even every software iteration is often exclusive to one specific motherboard which means using newer versions for other same chipset/line up motherboards does not often work.
 
I owned Gigabyte motherboard before and it had similar issues with the software, however I found a workaround by using newer version of software intended for other motherboards on same chipset. However once product was officially out of life cycle you basically receive no more updates for the motherboard software and often manufacturers purge/remove download links and files. I expected quality from the pricy ROG brand. Product quality, after sales support quality and software quality. Apparently I expected too much.
 
So after 5 months I can't use any of the advertised ASUS features like quick charging and RGB control or even monitor/control my system sensors without help of paid thirty-party software. Definitely do not recommend. 
 
 
 
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Have this mice. Recently started getting false trigger on middle mouse click button. Took it apart to clean and see if I could fix it. Turns out middle click button is not an Omron switch but regular membrane switch. Explains why it has different tactile feedback compared to rest of the buttons. And due to design of the plastic trigger, membrane got worn out/pierced in 1,5-2 years in my case. (I use middle click a lot) I think this is something people should be informed about when considering this mice, especially since it is marketed as Full Omron Switches mice. Also a lot of users report faulty/wobbly wheel which in my case might have caused membrane to fail significantly earlier due to free travel of the plastic trigger on the membrane's surface.