mr. frajeely, happy bday btw, you will probably have to upgrade your mobo/proc/ram tbh.. probably dont want to just pay for a very very slight upgrade to your processor

buy this
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103727
overclock a lot

my phenom 940 couldn't do playable tf2 streaming, not even close

i honestly think a sandy i5(i have no idea if the amd generation equivalent can compare) is bare minimum and even then I personally have stuttering issues.

My FX-8120 @ 3.9Ghz drops me below 200 FPS frequently when streaming at 480p. Don't get an AMD please.

http://obsproject.com/

contact brad

The cheapest solution would probably be to get a capture card.

If you use a lower bitrate/resolution/FPS you might be able to do it. But it'd be worse than ggyg's stream so I wouldn't suggest it. Capture card or upgrade.

EDIT: I can do 480p @ 24 FPS 2000 bitrate without any noticeable lag/effects. My FPS counter in TF2 stays constant regardless but it definitely spikes because of the CPU strain on encoding. Phenom II x3 3.4GHz, 4GB DDR3 1333 MHz ram, and a 4850 radeon. Any higher resolution and I get spikes of lag (especially when loading new areas).

is AMD just out of the question? I don't mind spending money, it's just that I didn't feel like practically rebuilding my computer from scratch unless I had to. If doing a big upgrade is needed, I would really appreciate a few links to get me started.

You'd have to upgrade your mobo and get a good i3 or i5 if you wanted to stream at a good fps.

All you can upgrade to is a Phenom II (your motherboard only supports up to AM3, not AM3+), which is what I had. Lots of stuttering at 3.2 GHz, I doubt it would be much better at 3.4.

I recently got a new computer with an i5 3570k and it's really great at stock speeds for streaming. Looking at the above, it seems like you want to go with this if you don't want to overclock. i7s, IMO, are really just marginally better i5s. You pay ~$100 more for a .1 GHz increase, hyper threading, and like two other features. Not worth it IMO. I've heard that FX processors (AMD's best processors) are not really that great for streaming.

I understand you don't really want to upgrade your motherboard, but you're pretty much going to have to do that to upgrade your CPU. GPU could probably be upgraded as well, but I wouldn't worry about that as streaming puts the most pressure on your CPU. As for recommendations, this is what I have:

Motherboard: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157293
CPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116504
RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=20-231-460
GPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161350&Tpk=his%20radeon%20hd%206870%201gb

I doubt you'd be willing to pay for one, but an SSD is a nice investment. Not important, but most things load faster, especially the OS. Still, I'd focus on the motherboard and processor, but keep this in mind.

I literally just upgraded from your same exact pc. UPGRADE IT ALL.

Best 500 bucks i ever spent.

Thanks :] I'll check it out.

What did you upgrade to? I check out your stream from time to time and it runs incredibly smooth.

Because i was basically in the same boat as you and had to upgrade my mobo (and didnt even want to go through the hassle of building my own shit again) i grabbed this on sale for around 500.00:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=7375900&tab=7&SRCCODE=WEBLET03SHIP&cm_mmc=Email-_-WebletMain-_-WEBLET03SHIP-_-03ship

Swapped out the power supply with my 600w and the videocard because i had just upgraded that... and it has been everything i wanted + more. Also haters dont hate im too lazy to build my own again... and i have no patience and wanted something asap.

i don't know if anyone here actually got a capturecard. it is technically the cheapest option(john was talking about a convenient one a few months ago), but I'd only get one if you had confirmation that it actually works well with tf2. i think seanbud was saving for one?

i want you to stream too

u will have to change your mobo.. i recommend i5 3570k though

Wait, I share a birthday with TheFragile? Best birthday present yet! .....only present yet.

Today is my significant others bday too. WHAT A DAY.

If you're not already, use OBS game capture. You'll need to use the 32 bit version for tf2.

Not a bad idea if you really want to stream and don't want to be hassled with a rebuild.

You could try a capture card, but if you don't want to do that then you'll almost definitely have to get a new mobo/processor/graphics

Every day is my birthday, as Basik made known I suppose. :p

Also, huge thanks for everyone's input.

Would recommend 2500k minimum to maintain a comfortable framerate in TF2 while streaming. Gigabyte has some pretty solid mobos in the $120 dollar range, so it would be like a $350-$400 investment or so including RAM.

If you get a Phenom II X6 processor, which your board supports, when streaming you should get similar framerates to what you get now. The x6 processors aren't really sold in retail anymore, but you can easily find them used. Compared to your current processor an X6 would be a decent upgrade. You get L3 cache on the chip, which Athlon IIs lack, as well as two extra CPU cores. You would see a small bump in TF2 framerates when not streaming, but nothing drastic. If you want a lot more performance you simply need to upgrade to Intel.

I bought these as well as some good RAM, so pretty much everything is set except that I haven't put everything in my computer. However, I didn't buy a new video card yet. I'm considering sticking with my GTX 280 in the meantime. Will this hold me down a lot? It runs all of my games at a very desirable FPS, but I don't know how demanding video cards are for streaming.

As mentioned in the original post, the only game I truly care about streaming here is TF2 and source engine games in general. Streaming some Super Street Fighter 4 would also be cool but not absolutely mandatory.

Since you already bought the parts, why not give it a try with the 280 (as long as the 280 is compatible with the mobo) and see how it goes. That way you don't have to spend money upgrading parts that didn't need upgrades. If it doesn't work out, get a $150-200 GPU and you should be set.

i have been able to stream with great framerates in tf2 on my amd fx-8120, which ends up being pretty comparable to the old phenom x6's as far as streaming goes.

Streaming doesn't affect the video card at all. The video capture is done on the CPU.

But wouldn't having a GPU with decent VRAM help alleviate some of the CPU usage for not only streaming but also gaming and in turn help the CPU concentrate more of it's resources for said stream? If so, then I think having a decent GPU would in fact help, but not too sure. Someone correct me?

Abe?