prefixing column names in return from SQL JOIN

[eluser]m4rw3r[/eluser]
The result of

Code:

SELECT threads.* FROM threads LEFT OUTER JOIN posts ON threads.id = posts.threads_id

is the same as

Code:

SELECT * FROM threads

so that eliminates the benefits of a JOIN quite brutally .

This with aliases is a possibility I have considered, but then I have to use SHOW COLUMNS FROM ... 2x and then make some PHP processing assembling the query.

I need this (maybe not really, but it would make some performance improvements by limiting the number of queries) for my IgnitedRecord model (thanks to nmweb for the name :-) ).
The reason I need it is that I need to split the result into two objects, one for the requested object, the other for the related one.

But maybe the performance improvement is not necessary, I don't know.