The 3.73GHz is a Prescott core, by the way. The fastest Northwood Intel made was at 3.4GHz, 3.46GHz if you consider Gallatin as a Northwood derivative, which it was. I'd be delighted to run comparative Civ 4 benchmarks.
Sorry when you said "my 3.73GHz Pentium 4 based system" you failed to mention if it was a 2048mb L2 or 512mb. The dif is rather great. I Figured Northwood overclocked to 3.7 ghz fit the bill. Had you owned the top teir in all respects (mainly L2 and clock) it'd have made sence to include both in your comparison argument for drawin up maps, Correct?
About the 50%, a lil inflated according to offical statements I read. Intel qoute around 40% more effiecency over netburst. How do we know if this was netburst eqpt with lesser mobos then what Pent 4 users Today have eqpt to their 2006 Cedarmills?
Also, 1 thing you forgot to say was how much ram both systems had. WHen drawin a comparison of which can crop the largest map on a giant rampig It fair to assume your new rig came loaded with more ram as you had vista and your Pressy was not 64 bit supported, Im assuming (unless it very last of 23 or so models), so it was at mybe 1gig.
Another thing before drawin conclusions with CIv4 is video card. We all know how important this is. Tiny details like the latest driver can play a facter.So nevermind if both Rigs where level, I doubt they were, but Was Prescott's driver even up to Date. I bet the recent purchase waz.
See in comparison using a civ3 peice of code to face off is a simple thing. The max ram is 512 and anythin G-Card related will sqaure that feild SAme time you have better stress tests for the CPU as without ram and video limits, calculations get truly enourmous creatin tremendous amounts by late game. This is not the same on a burdened leaky civ4 frame where everything ruins the game if not mid-late by ram, then you got late game jam as 3D mem add ontop of huge ram. You got All that going on while the CPU facters in the jumped up task list a MEGA map creates in fullblown effect. Not so easy to pick out whats weaking the turn. Mybe why 'Tom's' never chooses civ4 to compare latest hardware, ever.
Here is were I derived my conlusions quite by accident playin civ3 on mod sized maps and increases on all game calculations while clocking at 3.6 or less with 2048 L2 . Here by simple post in observations we showed better results on these 'Total realism 'sized mods run on mega huge, that Cedarmill beat Pent D and conroe in turn times. simple but no way official
One more limit your Pressy faced was bottle neck from a weaker mobo. Again, this Im assuming. Its widly know this model was severly limited more by the days motherboards then by heat issues.
ITs the motherboard that makes sure power goes to L2and cpu most effectivly so had you switched the newer mobo you had runnin on the core2 with your Penty is it possable it would have drawn up maps sizes that were plenty ? ...
Cedar is going around 4.6ghz on average these days. Something to think about.
. Its a shame you don't have civ3 as we could have sorted this out more effectivly(never targeted a core2 yet) . I may have to shop for some fancy civ4 megamap playing gear to level the feild. Somethin you forget to do for your Prescott when you ran you bench test
Chapter out
or pass you off as jus some kind a jerk! 
lol
