ARM is already there in the cloud, cf AWS Graviton. With Apple's M1 in the laptop/desktop (mac mini) space, ARM and its superior power/performance ratio is a significant contender for mainstream compute now.

I know a few VPS distributors, and I've heard pretty mixed things about ARM's viability in the server space. Not only is it pretty expensive relative to x86, it's also pretty slow: you won't be getting SIMD instructions like AVX, which are huge in the server space. The only thing ARM has going for it is low IPC, but I really fail to see many applications where you could benefit from that, much less one where it would be worth the price premium over x86.

Maybe in 5 or 10 years, ARM will be viable. But by then, we'll all be rocking RISC-V CPUs because someone realized that accelerating for specialized workloads isn't a crock of shit when 90% of your workload is video decoding.

Maybe read a bit about Graviton? AllIntel/AMD instances in AWS has Graviton processors to handle network/disk IO unless its a very old instance type, large amounts of AWS own services run on it as well.

The rumor is that Graviton instances are being sold at below cost for Amazon to put negotiating pressure on Intel/AMD.

And that M1 only looks as good as it does because of Apple's de facto monopoly on TSMC 5nm. That AMD cores are more than competitive at the same node.

Too soon do people forget that there were budget Zen 2 SiPs whooping the M1's ass back in 2019. It was at the expense of a slightly higher power draw, but that's a price I'm entirely willing to pay for a full-fledged x86 chip. I reckon that I'll accept no substitutes until RISC-V hits the mainstream in a more major way.

Now to only be able to buy a motherboard and a fast ARM CPU to my workstation and install NixOS to it, I'd be willing to try it out.