I don't know why this was downvoted as it's exactly right. The ISA does matter, especially for the frontend. Intel overcame the tax through essentially brute-

I don't know why this was downvoted as it's exactly right. The ISA does matter, especially for the frontend. Intel overcame the tax through essentially brute-force, but it's taken until now for the playing field to be level enough that the differences show up. There will never be an 8-wide decode x86 (issuing from a trace- or uop-cache doesn't count). (edited for clairity)