[bazizbaziz]

> if Ax series performance starts to exceed corresponding Intel mobile parts by >50% (enough to compensate for the overhead of binary translation for legacy x86 apps).

Another milestone for an Ax laptop would be a good power efficiency story. If Apple can show an Ax based laptop with exceptional battery life under real working conditions that would be quite attractive to many people, even if translated programs experience a 50% drop in performance.

In addition to the Appstore bitcode stuff other comments mention, the Universal Binaries tools that were used for the mass powerpc->intel migration will also help to diminish the need for binary translation in many cases. UBs mean that you don't solely need to rely on Bitcode translation via the iOS/Appstore, either, so these fanciful Ax laptops could run all normal non-appstore apps quite easily.