As hixxy said, I wouldn't worry too much about Ram compatibility. The QVL goes both ways anyway. While Asus may have not tested the memory to work with their motherboard, Gskill tested the motherboard and made sure their memory works with it:

As for going with Asus or someone else, personally for mine I still won't go with another vendor cause my build fits around Asus but yours might be different. Personally I don't like Asrock all that much nor do I like Gigabyte. My only real alternative to Asus would be MSI but more of a brand and ecosystem thing than anything else. In your case, I'd just go with Asus and call it a day after you update your BIOS.

Yeah, I agree Asus is the way to go.

They typically push out firmware updates more often and for longer than other manufacturers and generally have better (And more) software engineers.

Asrock Taichi though... Is stupidly hard to argue with that value, the last Asrock board I had lasted probably 10~ years with the integrated graphics core clock tripled 24/7. - Every feature you could imagine, Asrock probably has a board for that.

Keep in mind that Asrock used to be a a part of Asus too, so there is that aspect, I would like to think both brands benefited from that.


Gigabyte I can't stand the vdroop issues their boards exhibit, I would rather drop a toaster in the bathtub than have another Gigabyte board.

The Tuesday news:

SALES /PLAYER COUNT & DEALS

Activision is making more money on PC than consoles for the first time, and the gap is widening
https://www.pcgamer.com/activision-is-making-more-money-on-pc-than-consoles-for-the-first-time-and-the-gap-is-widening/
The PC is about to get more important for one of the biggest videogame companies in the world. According to Activision Blizzard's latest financial report, the PC platform outperformed consoles by $27 million at the start of 2023, continuing a trend with the Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, Diablo, and Overwatch 2 publisher that's been consistent for nearly a year now.
Between January 1 and March 31, Activision made $666 million on PC versus $639 on console. Its PC segment also outsold its console business throughout half of last year, though console did outsell PC overall for Activision in 2022.
This is a notable change: As far back as far as I can look at Activision's publicly available financial reports, console has always been king. This was the case in the early 2000s at the peak of Tony Hawk and Guitar Hero, in the 2010s when Call of Duty was on the rise, and even after Activision bought Blizzard in 2008 (WoW subscriptions were still big, but not Call of Duty big).
>> But PC gaming is dead, right?

GOG has launched a new sale: the GOG Staff Picks: Team Blue vs Team Purple, with up to 85% discounts during 7 days: https://www.gog.com/en/promo/20230509_gog_staff_pick.

Steam has new deals, including new weeklong deals:

• The Sensational Stories Bundle will let you grab 4 games with a 42% discount until May 11, or pick only one of the games with discounts that go from 20 to 50%: https://store.steampowered.com/publisher/beautifulglitch/sale/sensationalstories
• Chef Life: A Restaurant Simulator will be 20% off until May 15: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1122340/Chef_Life_A_Restaurant_Simulator/
• The Early Access title Amazing Frog? gets a 25% discount until Monday: https://store.steampowered.com/app/332570/Amazing_Frog/
• The Spellforce franchise goes on sale and puts its games up to 81% off until Monday, 15th: https://store.steampowered.com/sale/SpellForceMidweekMadness2023
• The Dead Island Definitive Collection packs three games with a 86% discount until the 15th. The individual games go from 75 to 85% off: https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/320/Dead_Island_Definitive_Collection/
• Team 17 puts its games on sale with up to 90% discounts until the 15th of May: https://store.steampowered.com/developer/Team17/sale/publishersale
• Hero's Hour will be 50% off until the 16th of May: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1656780/Heros_Hour/
• And here are some of the weeklong deals:
  • Void Scrappers gets a 20% discount: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2005210/Void_Scrappers/
  • The old school Roar of Revenge doesn't look like it worked well (only 28 reviews), but because of the fact that it properly looks like a pixel era game, not a blocky mess, it deserves some love. Plus its 40% off: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1680500/Roar_of_Revenge/
  • Founders' Fortune is half its usual price: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1104330/Founders_Fortune/
  • Sacred 2 Gold is going to be 75% off: https://store.steampowered.com/app/225640/Sacred_2_Gold/
  • And the last of this list, Fahrenheit: Indigo Prophecy Remastered, gets an 80% discount: https://store.steampowered.com/app/312840/Fahrenheit_Indigo_Prophecy_Remastered/

Fanatical has five 24 hours Flash Deals:

• Master of Magic is 40% off: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/master-of-magic
• Steelrising gets a 62% discount: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/steelrising
• LEGO® Star Wars™: The Skywalker Saga Deluxe Edition is 65% off: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/lego-star-wars-the-skywalker-saga-deluxe-edition
• Ghostwire: Tokyo gets a 70% discount: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/ghostwire-tokyo
• And Jurassic World Evolution 2 - Deluxe Edition is 80% off: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/jurassic-world-evolution-2-deluxe-edition

SOFTWARE & DRIVERS

-Empty-

MODS, EMULATORS & FAN PROJECTS

It took 13 years but Doom 2 RPG has finally come to PC
https://www.pcgamer.com/it-took-13-years-but-doom-2-rpg-has-finally-come-to-pc/
Doom RPG is an oddball entry in id Software's Doom series. It was originally released in 2005 for the mobile devices of the day—the pre-iPhone era, remember—and instead of being a straight-up shooter it incorporated a number of basic RPG elements. It did pretty well for itself too, earning high review scores and several mobile game awards, and spawning a sequel, entitled (of course) Doom 2 RPG.
It took 17 years for Doom RPG to finally come to PC by way of an unofficial fan port, but fortunately the wait for the sequel hasn't been quite as long—you can pick it up right now courtesy of Gec.Inc, the team that ported the original game.
>> There's a 2.5 minutes video of the mod.

Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom's leak has turned into one giant mess for the emulation community
https://www.pcgamer.com/zelda-tears-of-the-kingdoms-leak-has-turned-into-one-giant-mess-for-the-emulation-community/
In just over a week, leaked copies of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom have caused a degree of chaos that even Ganon would be impressed with.
In late April, I spoke with developers behind the Switch emulators Yuzu and Ryujinx about the likelihood of their emulators being able to run Tears of the Kingdom shortly after launch. The prognosis was optimistic. But then the game leaked well ahead of launch, putting the developers—as well as Nintendo—in a tense and volatile situation.
The emulation teams have forbidden all discussion of running Tears of the Kingdom from their Discord servers—Yuzu only allows vague discussion of the contents of the game, but requests for help or discussion of performance quickly earns chatters a deleted message and a warning or ban. To avoid being involved with pirated material, the emulator developers have vowed, at least publicly, not to release updates targeting issues with Tears of the Kingdom. "We are waiting for the game to release, so that members of our team can each legally dump their own copies of the game," Yuzu lead developer Bunnei told me on Monday.

GAMING NEWS

Star Wars Jedi: Survivor Patch 4 will reduce traversal stutters
https://www.dsogaming.com/patches/star-wars-jedi-survivor-patch-4-will-reduce-traversal-stutters/
Electronic Arts has announced that the fourth major update for Star Wars Jedi: Survivor will release later this week, and Respawn has shared its complete changelog.

Part two of the Tuesday news:

Conan Exiles celebrates its fifth anniversary with cake and a sale
https://www.pcgamer.com/conan-exiles-celebrates-its-fifth-anniversary-with-cake-and-a-sale/
Barbarian survival game and genital physics simulator Conan: Exiles is five years old today, and developer Funcom is celebrating the anniversary in a bunch of ways. The headline announcement is that the game will be going on sale at 50% off later today, with the deal starting at 11 am ET (17:00 CEST) and running until May 15. The Isle of Siptah expansion, which adds a big new chunk of land to the game, will be on sale too, though its price will only be dropped by 20%.
>> The discount went live yesterday, 50% off at Steam, still full price at EGS.

Sign up now to test tabletop-inspired RPG For the King 2 for free later this week
https://www.pcgamer.com/sign-up-now-to-test-tabletop-inspired-rpg-for-the-king-2-for-free-later-this-week/
The tabletop-inspired roguelike RPG For the King made a very good impression when it arrived in 2018, and the latest trailer for the sequel also looked promising when it arrived in February. Of course, "looked promising" doesn't always mean much when it comes to how a game actually plays, so the good news is you'll have a shot at trying it yourself in a beta set to begin later this week.

Sci-fi city builder Ixion gets a much-needed difficulty update
https://www.pcgamer.com/sci-fi-city-builder-ixion-gets-a-much-needed-difficulty-update/
I was impressed by the atmosphere and detail of last year's sci-fi city building sim Ixion, but it was undoubtedly a game with a few scorch marks seared across its hull. One of the bigger issues was its unpredictable level of challenge, something Alexander Chatziioannou noted in his review: "The way Ixion stealthily slides into doom-spirals of unsustainability makes reloading preferable to redesigning."
Developer Bulwark Studios has clearly been listening, as the game's latest update introduces a suite of difficulty options. In a press release, Bulwark detailed the three primary difficulty options (...)
>> It's also one of Steam's weeklong deals, 30% off.

This cozy farm sim is 'akin to Stardew Valley' except you never know which of the locals is secretly a serial killer
https://www.pcgamer.com/this-cozy-farm-sim-is-akin-to-stardew-valley-except-you-never-know-which-of-the-locals-is-secretly-a-serial-killer/
It increasingly feels like I need a full alignment chart matrix to accurately describe the intersection of cozy games and farm sims. Were I to build such a chart then Grave Seasons would be in the "lawful evil" category. It's got those cute pixel visuals that immediately get clocked as cozy and it's got farming and romantic entanglement with townsfolk except wait, it's actually about catching a serial killer. And if you aren't careful you might romance the culprit before you figure out who it is.

Destiny 2 cheat maker refuses to show up for court and now owes Bungie $6.7 million
https://www.pcgamer.com/destiny-2-cheat-maker-refuses-to-show-up-for-court-and-now-owes-bungie-dollar67-million/
Another day, another big lawsuit win for Bungie: This time around, the Destiny 2 studio has won a $6.7 million default judgment against Kunal Bansal, the operator of the cheating website lavicheats.com.

This MOBA mutation where you don't fight other players will get a closed beta next month
https://www.pcgamer.com/this-moba-mutation-where-you-dont-fight-other-players-will-get-a-closed-beta-next-month/
Evercore Heroes looks like a MOBA, but doesn't play like one.
It's a team-based competitive action game where, instead of attacking the other teams, you travel around the map to level your heroes up and prepare to defend your base from waves of monsters. It has a variety of playable heroes with abilities that are inspired from Riot and Blizzard games, which also happens to be where some of its lead developers came from.

NVIDIA to launch GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8GB this month, 16GB model planned for July

https://videocardz.com/newz/nvidia-to-launch-geforce-rtx-4060-ti-8gb-this-month-16gb-model-planned-for-july

"Fuck you 70 class" - Nvidia probably. Great news if true even if the interface is 128 bit, the 32MB of L2 cache and increased clock speed should help.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 variant to feature AD103 GPU

https://videocardz.com/newz/nvidia-geforce-rtx-4070-variant-to-feature-ad103-gpu

Maybe a Super refresh if true or a "KO" version

AMD to showcase Next-Gen Data Center and AI technology on June 13

https://videocardz.com/press-release/amd-to-showcase-next-gen-data-center-and-ai-technology-on-june-13

Pretty crazy how much they made on PC vs consoles. If only the gpu market wasn't such a dump pile.

After being like the 6th game this year that got fixed after many patches, we are truly in an era of buy the game after 1-2 months.

Oh! So as long as it's EXPO, it should work no matter if it's on the supported list or not. Gotcha.

Thanks for your reply.

I had already checked GSkill's compatibility list, but there's that little part of my brain that went like "oh, it works with every motherboard? How convenient, right? Not sketchy at all!" and well, you know, if something feels too good to be true, maybe it's because it is.

Gigabyte is out of the question. I've had two systems with Gigabyte boards and I had troubles with both. It will be a long time before I give them another chance. Plus, if you check a bit online, their customer support is awful.

And when it comes to MSI, they put themselves out of the picture. They have 17 AM5 boards listed on their Global site, but they only list 6 in their Spain site. And out of those, there's only one X670E board, the Carbon WIFI model, and it retail for around 600 €. I fail to see the reasoning behind that decision, but it's up to them. So yeah, thanks, but no thanks.

And so I'm left with either Asus or AsRock.

Thanks for answering my doubts. 

Yeah, the Taichi motherboards seem great but, besides the price, there's the problem that they're E-ATX, and my case wouldn't fit them.

I also knew that AsRock and Asus are part of the same group. Asus split its business in 3 parts and, years later, one of those parts bought AsRock. It's weird how things work sometimes.

Thanks to you as well for your comment.

Now I only have to decide but, thankfully, the motherboard doesn't seem to be flying of the shelves. There were 49 units when I checked the sale yesterday morning and, as of now, there's still 39 left. While I'll keep an eye on it to avoid surprises, I'll try to hold a bit longer since the store will keep this sale for two weeks and next week another store will launch a sale as well. Who knows if they'll also put some AM5 boards on sale.

Also, checking it a bit more, it looks like I missed another good deal, with the ROG STRIX B650E-F GAMING WIFI being on sale at only 250 €. At first glance I'd only be losing one M.2 slot for extra rear USB ports and a Thunderbolt header (that I don't think I'll need).

I mean, in theory. XMP/EXPO can be jank in some setups and that's unfortunately more or less unpredictable (but hopefully rare if everything is up to date).

So you're kind of playing all the Street Fighter games you have and then you'll play another fighting game. Sound more like a theme run ratehr than a franchise run, but it's more than ok.

And I see that you're going with an RPG, fighting and (mostly) action games playthrough at the moment. Sounds fun, tho I'd need to go through some relaxing or slow paced game between those, but maybe that's what you get with the RPGs.

I'll believe the existence of 16GB 4060 once I see them, and then I'll want to get a look at the price hike they have over the regular ones.

The AD103 based 4070 will likely not leave China, unless Nvidia has a lot of those defective AD103 chips, and it doesn't seem like they'll perform much different from the regular model.

So, if it won't launch before Spring'24, does it mean it will launch during it? I mean, the Switch has had an amazing run, but it's quite clear it's well past its peak and Nintnedo will need to launch a successor sooner rather than later.

With that said, we haven't heard rumors or leaks about it coming from publishers or developer focused leaker, that usually are the first to spill the beans about developer kits getting in the hards of developers, and Nintendo will want to send them those a good 6 months before the launch of the new console if they want to have some kind of third party support during the launch window.

Since consoles are becoming more and more like PCs, the old "just plug and play" advantage they had has banished thanks to the constant game updates. So it makes sense that some of them are trying to game PC. More so since Sony started porting its games as well.

With that said, I don't think it's as easy as that, and this is just the result of several events happening at the same time. Bringing CoD back to Steam has proven an excellent decision, selling a lot more copies than in previous years when the game was locked to their own store, plus WoW Classic seems to be quite popular and Overwatch 2 has been another success. All of that has surely increased their PC business while the console one has probably remained stable compared to previous years.

And yeah, now more than ever it makes a lot of sense to not buy anything at launch and just wait for a bit before buying any game. You save yourself a lot of troubles... and maybe some money as well.

So it's like tossing a coin, you don't know what you'll get.

Thanks for the follow up.