[thow-58d4e8b]

Large part, likely the majority, of Intel's CPU dominance had been a result of their "unfair" advantage in fabs, not in hardware design. Often quoted rule of thumb - 90%/10% - 90% of the progress in semiconductors is attributable to process shrinkage, 10% to improved the hardware design. TSMC contributed the lion's share in making AMD competitive again. Design-wise, chips from Intel, AMD and Apple are all incredibly impressive. Afaik, Apple pays the top dollar to get access to the highest-end TSMC process - any performance comparisons should keep that in mind

[greggsy]

I’d be very interested to know how much licensing costs might be, given the co-dependence there is between Intel and AMD in that space

[Macha]

My understanding is that everything was pretty much wrapped up with the quid pro quo settlement where Intel allows AMD an x86 license and AMD allows Intel a license the x64 extensions, and it also applies to extensions since then like AVX.

Here's the terms: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/2488/000119312509236...

I don't think any money actively changes hands on an ongoing basis for this, but when this was signed Intel did pay $1.25 billion and AMD agreed to drop anti-trust complaints against Intel.