[impactX]

I put together an AMD machine (AM3 mobo with Phenom II x4 925) 2 years ago banking on the fact that there will be a noteworthy Bulldozer for upgrading later on. According to the reviews, the Bulldozer did not end up being as good as it was hyped up to be.

I use the machine mainly for light gaming (Heroes of Newerth mostly, and Diablo III when it comes out), which I am sure the Radeon 5850 will handle just fine. However, I have been wanting to stream 1080p or 720p smoothly and the CPU has been quite a let down.

With a Blackmagic Intensity Pro and Flash Media Encoder 3.2 (with H264), I was only able to stream 720p at 10fps with nothing else running while people with mid to high-end i7 machines can stream 1080p WHILE playing games... Anyway.

With that said, I can either get 1) an 8-core FX-8120 for around ~CDN$201 or 2) get a 2600k or wait for Ivy Bridge 3770k to come out for around ~CDN$575 (new mobo, CPU and RAM) and give my current machine to my wife (less the video card).

So my question is, do you think the FX-8120 or even a 6-core 1100T will be sufficient for what I need (stream and encode on the fly at 1080p while I play games) or do I need an i7 as multithreads really help in encoding while I play games?

I don't really want to waste 200 bucks just to have AMD disappoint me again haha. Will probably need the RS gurus and Skinnypupp to chime in here. Thanks in advance!