If I'm not mistaken, AMD will unify its motherboards, with the upcoming AM4 platform, and the first chips that will use that new platform are the Bristol Ridge APUs that will launch soon.

What I don't know is if AMD will still rely on a Northbridge to provide the PCIe lanes or if they'll go like Intel and put that into the CPU.

There was a blurry (of course) pic of the AM4 motherboard AMD used to demonstrate the new chips at Computex, and it doesn't seem to have a Northbridge chip.

http://wccftech.com/amd-am4-motherboard-bristol-ridge-apu-spotted/

Having already the northbridge included in APUs it would perfectly make sense, with unified mobos, a northbridge on board would be redundant when using APUs, and it also offers the possibility to get an updated northbridge when upgrading the CPU, and for a modest increase in CPU cost it probably generates bigger savings on mobos.

Yeah their chipset stagnation was pretty terrible.  The 990FX is (I think) essentially just a rebadged 700 series chipset... AMD relied on 3rd party chips for things like USB 3.0 and PCI-E 3.0 and Sata 3.1.

With that said, Socket AM3+/AM3 was neglected whilst they pushed APU's.

AMD integrated the full North Bridge a long time ago on it's APU's, Intel did the same around the same time with Sandy Bridge.
On the full desktop side though, AMD started migrating parts of the North Bridge starting with the Athlon 64.

I think with Zens release though, AMD could take two apparoaches... Integrate the North Bridge fully onto the CPU die or Combine what's "left over" with the South Bridge. (Which will likely have some elements migrated over to the CPU also.)
There are advantages to either approach.

You are also correct. AMD will use one socket to rule them all.

I'm puzzled about the Zen and the supposed 40% increase in IPC, which sounds so damn little for five years of CPU development.

How do popular Intel CPUs in the last few years like Core i7-2600, i7-3770, i7-4790 and i7-6700 compare to each other in gaming performance?

A 6700k is less than 20% faster than a 2600k in games. That is with a 10% higher clock.

However that does not make the Zen improvement impressive as they basically started from the very bottom already.

The animations won't change because those are the standard Piranha' ones. I don't think i saw much better from them before.

CPU performance in games really depends on the king of game you're playing, and if they are more CPU or GPU intensive.

For example, and I'll use TechSpot as they benchmark games with different CPUs too, Star Wars: Battlefront, Rise of the Tomb Raider, The Division, DOOM or even The Witcher 3 aren't very CPU intensive games, so there's little difference between an i5-2500K and a i7-6700K.

Other games, like Project Cars and FallOut 4, do show improvements with more powerful CPUs, and then there are games like Overwatch that show big improvements the faster your CPU is (but given that all the AMD FX chips and even Intel's i3 achieve 60fps, does it really matter?).

Which games did you play? Were it roomscale games or some games in sitting position? How did you like them? Feld some dizziness, vertigo or something else which made you uncomfortable?

How comfortable was the headset? Did the cables were in the way (if it were roomscale games)?

Were you happy with the resolution / pixel density?

I'm collecting some first-hand experiences in this thread: http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread.php?id=219648&page=1#

I have no idea how this would look, but they've done it:

Mozilla Publishes WebVR 1.0 to Nightly Releases

http://www.pcper.com/news/General-Tech/Mozilla-Publishes-WebVR-10-Nightly-Releases

Earlier this month, the W3C published an Editor's Draft for WebVR 1.0. The specification has not yet been ratified, but the proposal is backed by engineers from Mozilla and Google. It enables the use of VR headsets in the web browser, including all the security required, such as isolating input to a single tab (in case you need to input a password while the HMD is on your face).

Firefox Nightly, as of August 16th, now supports the draft 1.0 specification.

The browser currently supports Oculus CV1 and DK2 on Windows. It does not work with DK1, although Oculus provided backers of that KickStarter with a CV1 anyway, and it does not (yet) support the HTC Vive. It also only deals with the headset itself, not any motion controllers.

Surfing the web with a VR headset. I guess it has its advantages if you're watching videos or pictures, but I can't see the point for forums like ours.

It will make a lot more sense with the future generations of VR when they finally include eye tracking. Not only will that make navigation in menus and browsers great but the next step would be virtual keyboards you can use with your eyes.

The coming years and gens of VR are gonna be exciting. Not sure if we will see eye tracking in the next gen or even gen 3. but Gen 4 could be something great with Gen 5 perfecting it.