Agree, last time the world had any significant CPU performance increase was SandyBridge, and that was the tipping point. Since then we have been using the same CPU performance with less energy usage. Apple already knows this that is why they continue to refine in other areas ( Macbook being a prime example ) rather then providing more and more performance where the user don't need / feel.
Interestingly 2011 was also the year SSD were available in not so luxury price. It was the when 64GB dropped to around $100. Anandtech has been calling this as the largest performance upgrade in history. And I would agree you should trade SSD for ANY CPU performance. That is assuming you are not using some more then a decade old CPU or you already have 16+ GB memory.
If the rumours are true then it is a combination of things making this a perfect storm ( not sure if that is the right way of putting it). Intel no longer has a significant lead in Fab node processing. The money from Mobile processor has help pure play foundry to catch up big time. Zen would offer significant performance increase that pass what most consider as enough ( for now ), and Intel hasn't had much performance gain with Skylake. Running along is the perfect match of new GPU coming from AMD. Which should be first the time ever AMD has a APU competitive with Intel in performance and run circles around Intel in GPU performance.
This sounds all good good for AMD, that is until Intel provides more detail on Goldmont, their next gen Atom.
Goldmont, and its Apollo Lake platform, provides all the essential features one would expect for the most common PC user for a very cheap price. Cherry Tail, based on Airmont was already doing well in Surface 3, if Goldmont as rumours suggest provides much higher IPC ( think Core2 Duo like performance rather then SandyBridge ) and comes with Skylake Gen9 GPU along with much cheaper price, this could be a tough battle.
Can wait for both to reveal more details, 2016 will be an interesting year for PC.