Hi there!

It's always fun to upgrade a gaming computer; I did a major system overhaul last December and had a fun time doing it. You seem to have a pretty clear idea of what you want, which is key. :-)

You can definitely have your OS installed on an SSD and buy a larger and cheaper hard drive for storage purposes. I'm a bit concerned with noise personally, and usually prefer to keep my system free of mechanical parts, such as standard hard drives and optical drives, but the option is there depending on your storage needs and budget. Also, keep in mind that larger SSDs, like 480GB and higher, tend to perform a bit faster. But the difference is subtle. And if you haven't already, you'll probably hear or read about the new interface standards that are being gradually introduced for SSDs to replace the SATA interface. Might be worth checking out, even though I guess it's a bit early for that.

Barebone kits still exist but aren't as popular as they once were. Frankly, motherboard and CPU installation has become so easy, with very little to configure in most cases, that you probably won't have any troubles, especially considering you've built computers before. The only tricky part is selecting the motherboard out of dozens of different models available within the same price range. Verify what standards it supports, such as the CPU socket type, the memory generation and clock speed, the number and speed of the USB ports, and of course, which interface is used for the hard drives and SSDs that will be plugged in it.

More experienced users will surely chime in too, but don't forget the most crucial part: Have fun!

I'm kind of late to the topic, but like many of you, I wasn't surprised at all by Valve's absence at E3. It's unfortunate; Half-Life is a great series that deserved more installments--let alone an actual storyline conclusion--but I've come to accept that it's not happening.

Great poll images, by the way! :-)

Yep, I also have the curse of the backlog. Dozens of games remain unplayed, or even uninstalled. At the moment, I'm going back to classic RPGs from the 90s, such as Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale. And considering it takes me months to finish any single one of them, I'm left to assume that I'll always have a backlog. Like, forever.

I usually don't mind it all that much, except when new games come out. For instance, I still haven't played Dragon Age: Inquisition and The Witcher 3, at all, despite pre-ordering both. So sometimes, I feel like I'm missing out by trying to catch up. You know, like a dog chasing its own tail. Then I feel dumb and eat ice cream with butter cookies.

That's funny, I've actually been switching back to Chrome this week on both my home and office computers, after about a year and a half of hiatus. I had been using IE11 ever since Windows 8.1 came out and thought it was great. Well, until the last IE update (11.0.20) made half the images blank on various websites. I couldn't find a solution so I went back to Chrome, signed in, and was happy to find all my bookmarks and settings intact.

I'm curious about Edge, the new browser that Microsoft is shipping with Windows 10. I'll definitely want to test it out and see how it is.

The sale looks decent, but this year my money went to the GOG Summer Sale, actually. The reason is I've come to appreciate GOG a lot more over the past months and, more importantly, I've pretty much bought all the games I wanted on Steam a few years back. There's literally nothing left that I want over there.

I personally like it a lot. Your mileage may vary, but on my system it boots up super quick and feels very lightweight.