Intel Core i5 2400S

While the Core i3 2120 operates at 3.3GHz while the Core i5 2400S is at 2.5GHz, the i5-2400S has a Turbo Boost frequency of 3.3GHz where as the Core i3 lacks Turbo Boost. Additionally, the i5-2400S is a true physical quad-core CPU while the Core i3 is just a dual-core with Intel Hyper Threading. This equates to the Core i5 2400S being around 40% faster than the i3-2120 in the Apache web server benchmark and 51% faster for the PostgreSQL workload. The energy-efficient CPU was not actually too far behind the i5-2500K in the PostgreSQL workload. The Core i5 2500K is a quad-core part operating with its stock frequency at 3.3GHz, but Turbo Boost can knock it up to 3.7GHz when needed.