The irony from the author's statement, is that Core 2 Duo was in no way top of the line in 2009. Core 2 Quad was already out for a couple of years, and in 2009

The irony from the author's statement, is that Core 2 Duo was in no way top of the line in 2009. Core 2 Quad was already out for a couple of years, and in 2009 Intel already had the Nehalem based i7 with quad cores and 8 threads that moved the goalposts an insane amount it became a staple CPU for the next decade till Ryzen launched. I still have a Core 2 Quad and Duo chips kicking around the house but at around 17 years old they're long in the tooth already to be remotely useful at anything. Even a raspberry pi would be better. A 4 year old Android flagships has more performance than those, let alone performance per watt where they're just not great to fire up at EU energy prices. At 65w-95w they make the most insane gas guzzling machines you could ever (not) want. Unless you get your energy for free, best sunset and scrap them for something more power efficient.