I''ve been reading the couple of threads here about different APIs and which compiler to use, etc, and it got me to wonering: Assuming win32 is your target platform, is there a significant performance difference between the binaries produced by VC++, Borland, or Dev-C++? And how do SDL applications compare to DirectX applications, performance-wise, for things like 2D graphics, sound, or input (ignoring the things that DirectX can do that SDL can not)?

well considering that sdl is merely a wrapper for directx on the win32 platform there wont be much difference in speed.

as for compilers, msvc++ seems to produce some of the most optimized code. however algorithms used mean more, and the code will be plenty fast no matter which compiler you use (we are talking a difference that would equate to a few frames per minute, which is not much at all).