Generally, Intel CPUs perform better than AMD CPUs for emulation in particular, due to their superior single core performance. Main reason for that is because Intel processors have higher performing floating-point units, and far greater cache/memory bandwidth/lower latency. This is true of many modern Intel vs AMD processors, as the high-end Intel processors are more efficient than the high-end AMD processors. Even though the Pentium D is clocked higher, the Core 2 Duo is faster due to the Core microarchitecture of the Core 2 Duo having so much higher instructions per clock than Netburst microarchitecture of the Pentium D that it can do more instructions per second despite having lower frequency. For example, a 2.4 GHz dual-core Intel Core 2 processor will generally outperform a 3.2 GHz dual-core Intel Pentium D processor. Newer CPUs generally perform better than older ones at similar clock speeds. Although clock speed is one of the main factors for good CPU performance, it is not the determining factor.
Though the particular architechture does matter.A common misconception is that a higher CPU clock speed guarantees improved emulation performance. Though 'i5' is quite vague, as that could be any of the generations or models, P4s are just that weak. For example, a 4GHz Pentium 4 is much, much less powerful than a 3GHz i5.
in GHz) doesn't mean that it is powerful. Just because a CPU has a high clock speed (e.g.
