Over a week ago, ASUS "quietly" unveiled a revamped Q-Release Slim mechanism—eagle-eyed hardware media outlet—Uniko's Hardware—spotted this revised quick release PCIe system on a freshly detailed premium ROG CROSSHAIR X870E APEX motherboard model. Wider press reportage jumped on the manufacturer's mixed bag of official responses; regarding reported damage inflicted by a "problematic" design. The ASUS North American office downplayed the severity of this matter, while colleagues in China launched a fairly comprehensive compensation program. According to VideoCardz, the latter organization has confirmed—as of last week—that a problem-free/improved Q-Release Slim system is on the way.

On Monday, Tweakers divulged its direct communication with ASUS—a spokesperson answered the Dutch site's query: "yes, a change has been made to the Q-Release Slim system for new X870 motherboards. Based on user feedback, we have modified the PCIe slot for the Q-Release Slim system, including removing a metal component to reduce the possibility of damage to the video card." The company representative noted that newly introduced/attached stickers will inform users about "correct system usage." Based on the aforementioned ASUS statement, Tweakers reported: "that both the original and revised versions of the system have been extensively tested and that users should study the included documentation to use the Q-Release Slim system properly. According to the manufacturer, both versions of the technology meet 'industry standards for wear resistance'." That last point suggests that ASUS will not be issuing a wide recall of currently released boards that feature original Q-Release Slim mechanisms.

We are aware of a number of cases where some AMD CPUs have boot issues with specific BIOS versions, and case with ASRock motherboard involving damaged CPU. We are taking these incidents seriously and have reached out to many of the affected users to gather information. We have obtained some of the motherboards for thorough inspection.

• A retrieved motherboard was in a system where the CPU showed burn damage. When inspecting this motherboard, we found that the motherboard does not have obvious damage nor burn marks around the VRM area. Measurements of the motherboard are also within spec. After cleaning and removing debris from the CPU socket, without further repair, the motherboard can boot up successfully with original onboard BIOS. It also passed long-term stress tests.
• With some BIOS versions, we have noticed some systems are not being able to boot with random 9000-series CPUs. BIOS 3.20 fixes this issue by improving memory compatibility.

ASUS has discreetly modified its controversial Q-Release Slim mechanism in the newly launched ROG Crosshair X870E Apex motherboard, removing a metal bracket linked to GPU PCIe connector scratches. The unannounced revision, spotted by Uniko's Hardware, follows months of backlash from enthusiasts who reported cosmetic damage to high-end GPUs after repeated use of the quick-release feature. While ASUS has not formally addressed the redesign, it acknowledges the issue—a stark contrast to its earlier dismissal of concerns as "typical wear-and-tear" after 60+ removal cycles. The controversy, first spotted in January 2025, escalated when users shared evidence of scratched PCIe pins on platforms like Reddit and Bilibili.

ASUS's global responses varied sharply: its US division downplayed functional risks, while ASUS China rolled out compensation, including motherboard replacements and store credits, and confirmed a redesign was underway. This regional split shows differing consumer protection norms, with China's aggressive compensation contrasting Western markets' reliance on warranty assurances. Competitors seized the moment. GIGABYTE's AORUS Japan publicly mocked ASUS with a 100-cycle stress test of its EZ Latch Plus, showcasing zero GPU damage—a direct jab at Q-Release Slim's durability. The campaign, echoed by GIGABYTE's Western accounts, emphasized rivalries in the premium motherboard segment. ASUS's quiet hardware fix avoids a formal recall, likely due to the niche impact—frequent GPU swaps are rare among mainstream users.

The next evolution of Rainbow Six Siege was revealed today at the Siege X Showcase. Launching on June 10, Siege X will introduce Dual Front, a dynamic new 6v6 game mode, as well as deliver foundational upgrades to the core game (including visual enhancements, an audio overhaul, rappel upgrades, and more) alongside revamped player protection systems, and free access that will allow players to experience the unique tactical action of Rainbow Six Siege at no cost. Plus, from now through March 19, a free Dual Front closed beta is live on PC via Ubisoft Connect, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S, giving players a first chance to play the exciting new mode. Read on to find out how to get into the beta and try Dual Front for yourself.

Dual Front
Taking place on an entirely new map called District, Dual Front is a new mode that pits two teams of six Operators against each other in a fight to attack enemy sectors while defending their own. Players can choose from a curated roster of 35 Operators—both Attackers and Defenders - that will rotate twice per season. During each match, two objective points are live at all times, one in each team's lane; teams must plant a sabotage kit (akin to a defuser) in the opposing team's objective room and defend it in order to capture the sector and progress towards the final objective: the Base. Sabotage the Base to claim victory, but don't forget to defend your own sector, lest your foes progress faster than you and beat you to it.

Around late January, concerned owners of high-end ASUS motherboards uploaded photo and video evidence of alleged physical damage caused by the manufacturer's PCIe "Q-Release Slim" system. Social media and forum posts showed worrying scraping and scratching on graphics card interfaces. The North American branch of ASUS responded to reports with a public service announcement: "in our internal testing and evaluation of the extremely small number of cases reported, we found no damage to the motherboard or graphics card that would affect functionality and/or performance....However, it is important to emphasize that any type of PCIe add-in card will exhibit signs of usage and wear marking after 60 continuous insertions and removals." Rival brands have kept tabs on this sorry situation; many offer similar motherboard-mounted GPU quick release systems. Yesterday, GIGABYTE's Japanese office posted a very "on the nose" demonstration of their EZ Latch Plus design.

The AORUS Japan social media account's "Ultimate PCIe Scratch Test" video involved the repeated insertion and removal of a candidate card from a GIGABYTE Z890 AORUS ELITE WIFI7 ICE motherboard. An anonymous employee completed one hundred cycles. Upon the experiment's conclusion, the graphics card's interface displayed zero evidence of physical deterioration. The manufacturer's Japanese AORUS branch boasted (via machine translation): "start building your PC with confidence! GIGABYTE's renowned easy DIY and ultra-durable design ensures smooth, hassle-free builds and rock-solid reliability. No more worrying about peeling golden finger contacts or scratches from metal edges." Their sarcastic delivery seemingly pokes fun at ASUS and the "troubled" Q-Release Slim system; it should be noted that it is a relatively new design. As reported back in early February, ASUS China launched an extensive customer support/compensation program. According to user accounts, some very expensive custom GeForce RTX 50-series cards have suffered cosmetic damage on PCIe interfaces. GIGABYTE's Western web presences have joined in on the fun—the AORUS Official social media account delivered a slightly different spin on their overall message: "game on with confidence! With our renowned DIY-friendly and Ultra Durable design, you'll enjoy a smooth, hassle-free build with rock-solid reliability. No more worries about gold finger paint peeling or scratches from metal edges—our design provides complete protection for both your GPU and motherboard."

ASRock has deployed beta BIOS version 3.20 today for its AM5 motherboard lineup to address persistent boot failures and burns affecting AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D processors. ASRock Japan refuted claims of permanent CPU damage, characterizing circulating reports as "misinformation" and identifying memory compatibility as the underlying cause rather than processor defects. The firmware patch targets a specific interaction between memory configurations and the 9800X3D's architecture that manifests as boot failures across what ASRock describes as a "minority proportion" of affected systems. A community-aggregated database on Reddit documented 40 failure incidents, with ASRock boards accounting for 32 cases. The failure pattern appears inconsistent—some systems fail immediately while others operate normally for weeks before exhibiting symptoms. BIOS flashback procedures have successfully restored functionality in multiple instances.

"The CPUs themselves are not broken. This is specifically a memory compatibility issue affecting system initialization," ASRock Japan explained via social media. Prior to releasing version 3.20, the company had recommended affected users downgrade to BIOS 3.10 as a temporary workaround. Notably, customers who RMA'd their processors and received replacements found their systems suddenly operational—suggesting the issue stems from complex firmware-hardware interactions rather than manufacturing defects. The problem appears isolated to the 9800X3D model and does not affect other processors in AMD's Ryzen 9000 series lineup. ASRock noted that the company will provide comprehensive technical documentation explaining the underlying mechanisms. AMD has yet to issue an official statement regarding the compatibility issues affecting their premium gaming processor.

The new ASUS ROG Astral graphics card design debuted last month, with the rollout of NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 and 5080 "Blackwell" GPUs. The flagship model—in overclocked form—is not a wallet-friendly prospect; as highlighted by W1zzard's in-depth evaluation. The "astronomically-priced" premium-tier quad-fan model is a hot property; in more ways than one—late last week, an unfortunate ownership experience was shared online. NVIDIA subreddit member—Impossible-Weight485—uploaded photo evidence, accompanied by a short story: "I was playing PC games this afternoon, and when I was done with the games, my PC suddenly shut down while I was browsing websites. When I restarted the PC, the GPU caught on fire, and smoke started coming out. When I took out the GPU, I saw burn marks on both the GPU and the motherboard." Post-absorption, initial community and press feedback posited that the problem originated with a Multi-Layer Ceramic Capacitor (MLCC), located not far from the card's PCI-E interface.

High-profile figures soon swooped in, with different theories and offers. A Team Green subreddit moderator weighed in: "not adding this one to our GeForce RTX 50 Series 12VHPWR Megathread. This looks to be a blown power phase, and not melting power connector. The original poster provided additional photos of the cable, in addition to the GPU connector photo in the post. Both looks pristine...Yes, I watched Buildzoid's video (see below), hence updating this comment...Thanks to Buildzoid for the education!" The owner uploaded another interior shot, seemingly showing burn damage on their ASUS ROG CROSSHAIR X870E HERO motherboard. The severity of this incident attracted the attention of Gamers Nexus—Lelldorianx (aka Stephen Burke) reached out to the damaged card's owner: "messaging you. We'd buy the board and GPU from you if you want to just take the cash and buy something else (or) skip the RMA process." Burke and his colleagues are actively investigating various GeForce RTX 50-series "pratfalls"—earlier this month, reports indicated that the team was already engaged in the sourcing of problematic units.

In a world where most of us work, communicate, play, explore, and make purchases online nearly every day, cybersecurity is more important than ever. Yet it's also a world where it's increasingly hard to know who to trust. Perhaps you've seen recent news reports that call into question the security practices of companies that you might rely on for the network for your home or small business. At ASUS, we're working to show you that not every networking company has the same level of commitment to cybersecurity. Recently, we joined FIRST, a longstanding and renowned organization that brings together a variety of computer security incident response teams from around the world. Our membership in FIRST enables us to take enterprise-level experience, security protocols, and incident response tactics and integrate them into the consumer market.

35 years of coordinating responses against cyberattacks
When you're the victim of a cyberattack, your priority is to re-secure your own hardware, data, and account access. But the incident response teams dedicated to cybersecurity have to take a larger view. What vulnerability made the cyberattack possible? What other systems could be affected? How quickly can a fix be deployed, and how might this fix affect other vital systems and functions? Answering these questions in today's connected world requires not just on-the-ground incident response teams, but international communication and coordination between these groups. Since 1990, this layer of coordination has been provided by FIRST—the Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams. Consisting of members from government agencies, educational institutions, military divisions, and the private sector, FIRST works to ensure a safe internet for everyone by creating channels for incident response and security teams across the globe to work together.

Mundfish Studio and Focus Entertainment are excited to celebrate the release of Atomic Heart's third DLC "Enchantment Under the Sea"! Available as part of the Atomic Pass, this DLC gets back to exploring the aftermath of the campaign's main storyline by leaving Limbo behind and taking players back to explore Facility 3826. There, they'll be introduced to a new underwater Neptune Research Center, new weapons and glove abilities as well as new sea-dwelling threats! Atomic Heart is out now on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One and PC. Benefit from discounts up to 67% on the Standard and Premium Editions, as well as all the game's DLCs on PlayStation, Xbox and Steam.

Look for answers in the depths of Facility 3826
"Enchantment Under the Sea" goes back to the spectacular combat gameplay that made Atomic Heart one of the highlights of 2023! Meet an eclectic cast of new and returning characters, and dive into the underwater Neptune Research Center with a Twin at your side to regain what was lost and find a way to save Mankind from a dismal future. This new adventure will even take you back to familiar locations that have changed beyond recognition like the flying city of Chelomey, now under the crushing rule of a familiar, formerly-friendly huge Robogirl.

Last week, important figures from the PC hardware community posted photo and video evidence of damaged GPU interfaces—seemingly inflicted by the ASUS PCIe Q-Release Slim system. Reports suggest that scratches and scrapes—on PCIe connectors—are the result of frequent engagement and disengagement. For example, the owner of a ROG Strix B850-A Gaming Wi-Fi S motherboard model performed sixty quick release cycles—eventually chipping away at the physical interface present on their GALAX RTX 4070 Ti HOF OC LAB card. The most vocal of critics believe that ASUS did not fully test its latest quick release mechanism—reserved mainly for inclusion on high-end motherboards. Feedback posted on Bilibili prompted Tony Wu—general manager at the company's China office—to look into the matter. In the meantime, his colleagues in North America have responded to Western news reports.

Approximately eighteen hours ago, the "ASUS_MKTLeeM" account posted a lengthy and highly comprehensive public service announcement (PSA) on NVIDIA's subreddit. The ASUS USA rep stated: "we know that many of you have ASUS products including our GeForce graphics cards and motherboards and likely saw the news recently regarding usage marks on a couple graphics cards that were installed in one of our motherboards featuring the new PCIe Q-Release Slim feature." They noted that they would welcome feedback from users on Reddit—through comments or private messages. The company messenger pointed out that the reported problems stemmed from unique user cases—professional reviewers (of expensive graphics cards) will not enjoy reading this response: "in our internal testing and evaluation of the extremely small number of cases reported, we found no damage to the motherboard or graphics card that would affect functionality and/or performance....However, it is important to emphasize that any type of PCIe add-in card will exhibit signs of usage and wear marking after 60 continuous insertions and removals."

In an FAQ on its website, Gigabyte has confirmed that the company will use liquid metal thermal interface materials on some of its RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 cards. The cards in question are its Aorus Xtreme Waterforce cards, all of which will be using a liquid gallium based TIM that the company claims will offer up to 10 times heat transfer coefficent compared to what the company refers to as traditional thermal grease. However, it's unclear if the traditional thermal grease is simple silicone based TIM or something more modern. The cards in question are the GV-N5090AORUSX W-32GD, GV-N5080AORUSX W-16GD and GV-N509DAORUSX W-32GD.

In addition to those three cards, the company has a further seven Aorus Master cards that will use what Gigabyte refers to as a "composite metal grease that includes metal particles, to deliver enhanced thermal conductivity performance", which simply sounds like a modern, higher-end TIM. However, the FAQ specifically states that both materials are "fluid-like" in room temperature and above, it seems like Gigabyte is using something a bit different here, rather than your run-of-the-mill thermal paste, since only a few TIM's are runny in room temperature. The company further points out that both TIM's are electrically conductive, so for those planning on swapping out the cooler on their cards, this is something to pay attention to. Gigabyte also points out that it's using a "quadruple protection system to prevent possible short-circuiting of important components" and goes on to point out that if the cooler is removed, at least a couple of these protections will be damaged and will no longer hold the TIM in place. The Aorus Master models are the GV-N5090AORUS M-32GD, GV-N5090AORUS M-32GD, GV-N5090AORUSM ICE-32GD, GV-N509DAORUS M-32GD, GV-N509DAORUSM ICE-32GD, GV-N5080AORUS M-16GD and GV-N5080AORUSM ICE-16GD.

HXL/9550pro and HardwareLuxx's Andreas Schilling shared evidence of the ASUS PCIe Q-Release Slim—the manufacturer's latest ejection mechanism—causing damage to graphics card PCIe connectors. Recent feedback suggests that repeated usage can scrape or grind off material present on a card's interface. HXL gathered critiques from multiple sources (owners of Intel 800 and AMD 800 series boards), and linked a relevant Bilibili video. The footage presents a damaged GALAX RTX 4070 Ti HOF OC LAB model, following sixty quick release cycles—paired with a ROG Strix B850-A Gaming Wi-Fi S motherboard. Tony Wu, ASUS China's general manager, eventually weighed in on community discussions—stating that he will investigate this matter and report back with his findings.

Schilling expressed similar frustrations—his chosen platform is producing unwanted results: "I'm not happy with the solution either. We use the Strix X870E-E Gaming for testing the graphics cards. So I have had to remove graphics cards from the slot a few dozen times. This didn't always go smoothly and very often the (GeForce RTX 5090) card got stuck in the slot. First damage visible." Press outlets have picked up on the recent surge in Q-Release Slim user feedback—several publications have gathered additional examples of the new mechanism inflicting damage on a variety of graphics card models.

Earlier this week, Taiwan experienced a magnitude 6.4 earthquake—this seismic event interrupted manufacturing activities at several TSMC chip-making facilities. As a precaution, foundry employees in both Central and Southern Taiwan were evacuated. Production resumed fairly quickly following inspections of crucial infrastructure—no major damage to facilities or equipment was noted. The latest reports suggest that a relatively minor number of TSMC wafers have been affected by the recent quake, while some recalibration of instrumentation is required to get things back on track.

Inside sources reckon that up to 20,000 wafers (possibly 10,000 at a minimum) could be scrapped—assessments are reportedly still underway, but a small proportion of client shipments could be disrupted. News articles point to this total being spread across three affected locations. Fab 18 is a key 3 nm production hub—situated in Taiwan's Southern Science Park, Tainan's Fab 14 specializes in 4 nm and 5 nm processes, and Fab 8 (Hsinchu) takes care of 200 nm. Industry experts believe that TSMC will bounce back quickly, and that the damaged wafer count represents a minor dent in the proverbial armor—on a good day, manufacturing output can reach up to 37,000 units.