It seems just like yesterday that Intel launched the Core 2 Duo series of CPUs and re-established itself as the king of the hill for x86 CPUs. As hard as it may be to believe, that was four and a half years ago. Since then Intel has been following their "Tick Tock" development model, delivering Core i7 Nehalem and Core i7 Gulftown along the way. Each launch keeps Intel ahead of the game, firmly perched at the top in terms of performance.