Used to be, but back then, Intel let their processor performance be driven by their marketing department. When they got the stick out of their ass and started designing chips with technology (and not marketing) in mind, I started to pay more attention. They still have a little bit of that stick in their butts (about SATA 6 and USB 3, as well as the number of PCI e lanes on a chipset) but for the most part, they're a whole lot better than they were back then. I've played with the i7 2600k and I WANT one.