Separate Streaming PC?

Hey guys so I'm thinking of building a PC just for streaming gameplay so my current system doesn't face the huge bottleneck while using fraps or anything (check signature for my system specs). Main reason being is I have a horrible cpu so gaming+recording is pretty much impossible lol.

One of my friends has some desktops that he doesn't use anymore, which I could get away with scrapping its PSU, motherboard, memory, and a hard drive with 64bit windows 7 (I don't know specific model numbers for the parts but I can check this weekend). The only other parts I believe I need is a capture card and cpu.

My question to you guys is what's the lowest of each (price wise) I could get away with to have a decent streaming only pc. I'm just starting out to record gameplay, so 720p is fine for the capture card. And I know an AMD quad core is like an i3, but would one of the new Vishera models work? And I'm trying to spend as little money as possible.

Thanks!

 

How exactly do you plan on capturing video from one PC to another? VGA/DVI capture card are hard to find, and the ones that do exist are ridiculously expensive. I believe Hauppage (sp?) just came out with an HDMI version of the PVR, so you might want to look into that.

 

Need a capture device and yeah it works. Some quality is usually lost compared to say FRAPS and a good cpu can handle FRAPS + gaming easily.

Maybe look into building a gaming rig rather than a streaming rig and do it all in one. I would only use a 2nd computer if its something you do a ton and plan to do as a 2nd hobby/job and do live streams as those streams take more cpu power to render than something like playclaw/fraps.

Once you get into a 2nd rig, then you have more work to do on setup, audio/video sync, etc as well.

 

A good entry level i5 would do wonders for a desktop based PC for streaming games, its when the PC has to render the game and then encode it on the fly for the livestream it gets tough for at least dual core based CPUs.
I know my brother got livestreaming to work on his aging AMD Phenom II X3 710 that runs at 2,6 GHz without overclocking. His motherboard cant properly handle the OC so it BSODs.

Personally i stream on the same notebook as i play games on, and as long as i keep it within reasonable limits the Intel Core i7 2720QM does it well enough while giving me the magical 60fps ingame.

 

Ok thanks guys.

Seems like building a desktop is looking to be a better idea, and if I did that I wouldn't have to purchase a capture card, right? Or would the capture card take a ton of strain off the CPU?

The main specs for the desktop would be:
-NVidia 560
-AMD quad core vishera or six core vishera
-maybe capture card?

My friend and I plan on recording gameplay from battlefield 3, counter strike, minecraft, and a few less popular indie games. My guess is the only thing that would really strain my system would be Battlefield 3 but the other ones should be fine. I honestly haven't tested out what fraps would do to counterstrike, but it completely destroyed battlefield and minecraft (this is on my e-gpu) and that was in single player. I have upgraded to a samsung 840 ssd compared to a external usb 2 hard drive from when I tested that, so chances are it won't be as bad.

An i5 is about $70 more than the six core amd, but do you think i'd be better off upgrading to that or buying a second 560 to sli them. If I don't have to I really wouldn't mind not having to spend the money.

 

A capture card is more suited towards recording console gameplay, im using Dxtory and i barely notice when i record games as long as the HDD i record to has enough write speed.
But if you want a good capure card suggestion i can recommend the Elgato Game Capture HD, got inbuilt Twitch.tv streaming in its software, with good OSX support as well.

 

Ok I'll check those games again once I get home, and a samsung 840 should have plenty read.

Is that card only for capturing console gameplay? On their site it doesn't say anything about recording pc gameplay just being able to send it to windows or os x.