The compiler in the Alpha edition of Visual C++ supports switches that allow you to optimize your compiled code for a particular Alpha processor while maintaining binary compatibility with other Alpha processors. Note, however, that some code-generation switches will create code that will not run on certain platforms.
These switches can be activated either in the Project Settings dialog box under Code Generation, or by manually typing the appropriate /Qa switch into the compiler command line.
The /QAtune and /QAarch switches let you separately set tuning and instruction set options.
For detailed information on code generation switches, see the Processor Optimization Options topic.