No it's not. What I loved about Google is giving me the ability to search the web. If my answer wasn't on the first page (or even the second), I'd refine my query until I would get it. Which was easy because Google was very deterministic, just your basic "AND" keyword search engine. Try a few synonyms maybe, different angle, synecdochical approach[1] and if all that didn't get you your answer, it probably wasn't there[2].
Today, you type in your query, Google tries to guess what you need, and shows you your results. If your answer is not there, you can try different queries, synonyms, whatever, but you'll get mostly the same results again. The web being unimaginably bigger than 10 years ago when I used the approach described above, I refuse to believe my answer's not there. Google is just being dumb.
Anyone know of a proper Search Engine? (I love Duck Duck Go but its index is rather small)
[1]http://www.searchlores.org/synecdoc.htm
[2]actually, you were probably not trying hard enough. Pressing on over the course of a week and getting some expert friends to help you would always show that your answer was in fact there. in some form or another.