PC to ...test... SW:TORFollow

Number 2 is the only one that lists a secondary HD unless I just missed it. 60 or 80 GB are gonna get filled up quickly unless you just use it for gaming.

#2 is the better machine overall. Secondary hard drives are still relitivly cheap dispite the shortage as long as you don't go after the really big ones. You could make an argument for the TI550's in the 1st machine being better than the 285 GTX's, but the I7 CPU seals it in my book It's the 2.66 GHz CPU, but thats easy enough to upgrade later.

Keep in mind when you buy a used PC, you buy all the problems, as well as the skill level of whoever put said PC together. Sometimes that can work out well, sometimes they are selling because they have an intermittant failure they can't figure out. If you get a good enogh frame, even with problems for a good enough price you can usually still put some money towards fixing it and come out ahead.

Touch screen monitors are basically USB devices. They will work with every motherboard on the planet, and will do "something" in most games. That being said, touchscreen interfaces, even with multitouch are really pretty useless for playing most MMO style games. You still need the keyboard, all the touchscreen gives you is possibly faster clickability, though I find that I can use a relaly good high resolution mouse faster than most people can use a touchscreen, because I only have to move my mouse a fraction of an inch to do the same task that requires 5 inches of hand movement on a touchscreen. They do have their uses, especially for CAD and artisitry, but they arent something you should focus on as a gaming perephrial at this time.

SSD's you have to be careful with. There are a couple of good manufacturers of them, and a couple of really bad manufacturers. OCZ for example makes dozens of very inexpensive SSD's. They are inexpensive for a reason. they have a horriffic failure rate. You should never, ever buy one from them. Intel makes good SSD's with a very low failure rate. Corsair makes good SSD's with a low failure rate. I personally own a Crucial 240GB 6GB / sec SSD, which I am quite happy with. it's been in for about 4 months now. The corsair and Crucial ones both use the same Sandforce controller. The intel ones use an Intel controller. OCZ tends to use a mix of sandforce and some other wierd ones, but they also cheap out on the memory they use. You want to look at the SSD you are getting, and match the throughput as well. If you don't have a 6GB / sec controller on your motherboard, it makes no sense really to get a 6GB / sec SSD, since you will pay a premium for that extra speed, and by the time you do upgrade the motherboard chances are you will upgrade the SSD as well since they will be going up in capacity fairly rapidly.

Starting with an Ibuypower or similar rig isn't a bad way to go, especially if you have never built your own computer and don't have anyone nearby to show you the ropes initially. You can also go the build your own route over an extended period of time too to make the financials hurt a bit less. Get a really good case one month, get a really good PSU the next, those components won't need upgrading often if you get the right ones. Then save for your motherboard and CPU, then the ram, then the video cards, then the drives, etc. Takes alot longer that way but you end up with a better system in the end ususally.