menturi

I am looking to purchase a license for Windows but am unclear on where to do this. I am specifically interested in a retail key license. I was initially considering purchasing a license from the Microsoft Store, but there were a few online posts deterred me from using this source, primarily because it a digital license to my understanding.

I've read a few posts that say how digital keys are tied to the motherboard, similar to OEM licenses. The whole reason I want a retail license is so it is not tied to my motherboard, and I can transfer it if I replace the motherboard at some point or build a new PC later on. It looks like the MS store only offers digital licenses though from what I can see. Or maybe number of transfers in a digital license is limited (it is unclear to me)?

There was a post on MS's Answers forum saying it is a digital license tied to my account, not a key license. I'm okay with a license tied to my account, but he had difficulties actually getting it to work since it wasn't a key that was simply emailed to him or something like that, so I'm hesitant to purchase a digital license from the Microsoft store and would rather purchase a key license that I can just type in at installation or first startup.

So I am interested in a legit source to purchase a retail key license, not an OEM license and not a digital license. But it is unclear where to actually do this. Any clarity on confusion on my part or suggestions for where to purchase such a license would be greatly appreciated?

I'm not sure what other community to post this question in so I hope it is okay to post here.

This is the first time I'm building a computer. I want it to support Thunderbolt 4 while using an AMD processor. I could use a motherboard with it inbuilt like the ASUS ProArt X670E-Creator WIFI, but reviews mention having issues with it so I'm thinking of avoiding it. So instead, I found a few add-in cards that support TBT4 (one by ASUS, ASRock and Gigabyte each).

The documentation for the ASUS ThunderboltEX 4, for example, lists various AMD X670-compatible motherboards, of which ROG STRIX X670E-F GAMING WIFI is one. So great, this mobo with this AIC should work, right?

But then I read "only ASUS Intel 500 series and later motherboards with a 14-1 pin Thunderbolt header can support ThunderboltEX 4 card", which suggests to me only Intel chipsets will work, despite AMD boards being listed on the compatibility list. I see very similar wording with the ASRock AIC as well.

So, why would AMD Boards (like for X670E) be listed as compatible when only Intel boards (500-series) would work? Am I misunderstanding something here?