I thought core was largely derived from the original Pentium family mainly the p3 mixed with a little of the front end of the p4 sorry that's probably a little too oversimplified but that's my basic understanding. No processor design is started from scratch you take what works and build on it... bulldozer will be the first largest step away from the base athlon architecture since the athlon 64 in along time.Hope it turns out well as well as the athlon 64 did *crosses fingers*