more pixels are better!

Les Olson wrote:

For any quantity the correct approach is to compare
first the actual value. Adjusted, normalised, or standardised values
can be compared IF they serve a purpose, and it does not matter
whether you are talking about "seasonally adjusted unemployment" or
normalised SNR. The trap, as in this case, is to use normalisations
that encode ideas about the right answer.

I agree with this completely. The question, “which sensor produces the best image quality” should be answered by comparing the actual values in questions... images produced by those sensors. And I can't think of any better normalizing process that encodes the ideas about the right answer than to compare two prints of the same size.

The OP was wondering if a high MP compact ever could, under idea conditions and through the use of brute megapixel power, produce a print that would “rival a smaller count SLR” (and if not, why.) The answer is flat out no, it can't. The simple fact is that at all print sizes, the image from the small-sensored camera will always appear to have more noise than the same image from the large-sensored camera...regardless of the pixel counts of the two sensors. That's a sensor issue. Also, diffraction places limits on how large the small-sensored image can be enlarged. The large-sensored image will have greater acutance. That's a sensor/lens issue. Both of these issues, and others, combine to give the large-sensored image better image quality all the time.

The only way a small-sensored camera will ever produce an image that will rival a large-sensored camera is if it's a picture of white wall.