[wplug] Compiler questions

[Embery, Nathan]

So, I was thinking the other day about how all these gentoo users keep
saying how gentoo is so much better because it compiles everything for you
hardware, and I've come to realize that's a bunch of crap. :) Or, is it?

I mean, since the compiler doesn't actually inspect your hardware and the
configure script just sets up your Makefile according to your software env,
where exactly does this magical 'for your hardware' thing come into play?
Really, all you can do is set -march= and maybe an optimization flag like
-O2 or something...

So, the question is, am I missing something? Or is it really unnecessary to
compile yourself when there are already 686 optimized binaries available?
Why even go to the trouble?

Obviously, there are size advantages to configuring you own kernel and
excluded exotic things you'll never need like ISDN and ancient chipset
support or whatever, but I just don't see it for you average software
package like mplayer.

Nate