Firmware update went fine and it rebooted with the rog led white the the 3 lights as normal then on to just the solid power light and the green flashing rog led. I went to get my laptop thinking it was SSDD but by the time I got back it had fully booted up.
I was all excited so I told my wife I'm going to reboot one more time using the power switch to test and got myself in trouble.
It is back to the problem before where it does the above and with just the solid white power light and pulsing green rog led like it is booting up (using the xenwifi led color code troubleshooting chart) and after 20-30 seconds just rebooted and starts the loop over.
I had the fix I identified pre-firmware update but it doesn't work now no matter what port connection variation I try.
I realized I've only been able to put this into recovery mode as well (solid purple rog light from holding reset button at boot), though I've tried to factory default only for it to boot up to the last configuration in the last when it would come back.
Does anyone know the proper way to factory default this model?
It's not listed under either method on the Asus website and I've tried them both anyway because why not and no luck. There doesn't even seem to be a user manual available for this yet, only a quick start guide.
Ugh, back on backup wifi for now until I can be sure I'm even following the correct methods of troubleshooting. Hopefully doesn't take too much longer to sort, though, because the end of the return window is fast approaching.