I miss those days as well. Silver lining is that the processor market is mature/saturated, so Intel still has some fierce competition: itself. Nearly everybody

I miss those days as well. Silver lining is that the processor market is mature/saturated, so Intel still has some fierce competition: itself. Nearly everybody buying an Intel desktop/laptop CPU already has an Intel desktop/laptop CPU. So Intel still has a lot of incentive to improve - they need to beat the performance of the Intel CPU you already bought in 2011 or 2012 or 2013 or whenever.