[3JPLW]

Another thing they can do: it allows them to introduce new non-ARM-standard ops and immediately recompile the app store to take advantage of them.

Every now and then I see a new comparison of the Swift/ObjC dispatch assembly. Now imagine — that could be a single opcode. Or the dispatch table could get pinned to a particular cache. Or it could be other micro-optimizations that they are in a unique position to exploit with full control of the language, compiler and chip.

I have no idea how feasible these things might be or how much of a gain it would create, but they can look through their corpus of LLVM-IR and identify hot-spots where a new opcode would speed everything up by some margin.

[bjackman]

Good point, but remember Apple license the ARM architecture from ARM (the company), and they probably aren't allowed to deliberately ship partially-compliant ARM hardware.

[azinman2]

Apple is much bigger than arm and could easily change the rules.

[gherkin0]

They may be smaller, but they have IP Apple needs now. Apple just can't do whatever it wants to just because it's big.

[azinman2]

They could buy arm, or offer enough cash until they capitulate.