There is absolutely no way I can imagine the i7-920 is a hotter cpu than FX-8 core. I have had both and my FX-8350 @ 4.8GHz needs a 360 radiator with good fans to run that 4.8GHz day in and day out when closed up inside a case with efficient air flow in and out. You really have no concept of how really hot an FX-8350 is at 4.8GHz.
I have very skilled friends that run their FX-8350s in the 4.7GHz range, even though they can get 2 hours stability with P95 Blend at 5.0GHz. They say they are just not comfortable with the voltage needed to run at 5.0GHz nor to deal with that much heat day in and day out so they downclock to roughly 4.7GHz even though they have very good water. In fact one friend that runs his new FX-8370 at 4.9GHz daily just remarked in the AMD cpu forum section while we were trying to bring a newer user up to date; that he had easily $1000.00 Usd in his cooling for his FX-8370. I will admit that friend went about $600.00 overboard, but he created a work of art with his water cooling plumbing.
Thermalright True Spirit 140 might have the cooling power to deal with the heat of an FX-8350 at 4.5 to 4.6GHz but unlikely very much more speed which brings voltage and HEAT. Plus the air cooler for cpu needs to blow air in an East/West orientation in a case that will get cool air in and out very effectively so cool air can get in and hot air out in a hurry.
So you want 4.8GHz with an FX-8350?
1. Boards fully capable of supporting such speed start at about $185.00 Usd.
2. Pretty good entry level cooling would likely run around $230.00 Usd to support 4.8GHz regularly.
3. Then you need a fan blowing over the VRMs of the fairly high dollar motherboard so that the cpu does not throttle due to over heating of the VRMs supplying the power to the FX-8 core at 4.8GHz and often even less cpu speed.
4. 2x4Gig sticks of DDR3-1866 ram is best overall since the FX supports two sticks of DDR3-1866. Slower ram will not hurt a lot but the sticks should be installed in pairs. Most X-58 motherboards used 3 sticks of ram.
5. So far the IPC of the Intel Cpus is just greater than the FX processors by AMD. That single threaded greater IPC or even multicored greater IPC can be a benefit in games and most surely with dual video cards.
6. Again I think the AMD cpu is getting the lean toward, strictly on a money basis but the entire cost of doing business had not been accurately considered. Now that can be one huge problem when everything "thought" needed was bought but the bought parts are not nearly enough to satisfy the demands of an overclocked FX 8 core processor. YMMV but it will not vary more than a tiny bit and then there you will be like all the rest of us that run haul booty FX 8 cores. We have monster cooling and the best motherboards money can buy to run 4.7GHz or slightly greater on a day in and day out basis.
RGone...
EDIT:
Thread: Gaming CPU, which one? AMD or Intel?
That is a very good thread about AMD vs Intel FOR gaming. Others cover just about what I wrote above, but it is different people saying about the same thing I said, so am not the only one that sees the real cost of overclocked FX-8350. The read is good all the way thru the first post of the second page. Thereafter it sort of runs off the rails chasing the merits of the 2 core G-3258 cpu.
By the way this thread was only a few down from where your thread is located right now. So the debate was already in progress.
END EDIT.