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Re:Why is Apple's M1 chip so fast? by FeepingCreature on Monday November 30, 2020 @05:10PM (#25259681)
So what stops x86 from adding the micro-ops as a dedicated alternate instruction set, Thumb style? Maybe with the implication that Intel will not hold the instruction set stable between chips, pushing vendors to compile to it on the fly?
Re:Why is Apple's M1 chip so fast? by freemint on Monday November 30, 2020 @05:56PM (#25260112)
Mirco Ops are usually much wider than instructions of the ISA. They are usually not multiple of 8 bits wide either.

An dedicated alternative instruction set would be possible but that would take die space and make x86_64+mine even harder to decode.