[snvzz]

>5% slower on SpecINT2k6, but 50% less area

That's a huge difference in area.

In line with SiFive tradition, always huge area advantage against any given performance point's ARM design counterpart.

I am amazed they manage to still keep this sort of advantage up, while tackling higher and higher performance points.

[Klasiaster]

Maybe it's like with software, once you add bloat/baggage over the course of the years it's hard to get rid off when trying to optimize again.

[snvzz]

It is a good thing that at least the ISA managed to catch up with every important ARM or x86 feature yet avoid that baggage creep.

Microarchitectures might need a full redesign once in a while, but if it can keep its RISC-V software moat, that's alright. Worked for x86 so far.