Does higher GHz always mean a better processor?

According to www.geekbench.com, here’s how the numbers shake out:

AMD Athlon 64 >> Geekbench Score (higher is better): 407,

Intel Core i7 >> Geekbench Score (higher is better): 329.

Can someone explain why the AMD Athlon 64 is ranked higher? Its clock speed is listed at 2.0 GHz (though mine actually runs at 1.60 GHz), which is obviously way lower than the 2.80 GHz on the Intel Core i7.

Does the Geekbench rating system actually mean anything?

No. You can't just judge different processor series based on their clock speed alone. There’s way more to it—architecture, cache size, IPC, and plenty of other factors.

I guess that’s how it works. But if that's the case, how am I supposed to figure out which of those two processors mentioned above actually performs better?

My current rig is running an AMD Athlon 64 with 1GB of RAM, and honestly, it feels way too weak to handle Windows 7 properly.
What kind of performance should I expect from a PC with an Intel Core i7 when it comes to running Windows 7?

Oh man, let's be real—that Intel Core i7 is basically a relic at this point, probably sitting on the shelf for about 10 years now.

No, no, and absolutely not. Windows 7 is NOT going to run on a machine like that. You might be able to squeeze some life out of the processor, but 1 GB of RAM is nowhere near enough. Your computer is way too old; you should just stick with Windows XP and nothing else. Don't even bother thinking about upgrading that PC—the whole thing is just too outdated.

Back in the day, AMD actually had a noticeable edge when it came to IPC (instructions per clock). Nowadays, the tables have turned. At the end of the day, you can't draw any solid conclusions just by comparing raw clock speeds between different manufacturers—or even between different generations from the same brand. It’s just not how it works. You really need to dive into professional reviews, benchmarks, and performance tests for specific CPUs based on what you actually care about. That's where you look at the price-to-performance ratio to get the full picture, and that's really all there is to it.

Check out this video

This is also a handy site for comparisons. For more specifics on a particular CPU, I'd recommend reading deep-dive reviews or Googling benchmarks for specific software

Thanks for all the input, everyone. I'll look through those links today and follow up with more questions shortly. Thanks again.