https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=64477
Bug ID: 64477 Summary: x86 sse unnecessary GPR spill Product: gcc Version: 4.9.2 Status: UNCONFIRMED Severity: normal Priority: P3 Component: rtl-optimization Assignee: unassigned at gcc dot gnu.org Reporter: zoltan at hidvegi dot com typedef signed char v16si __attribute__ ((vector_size (16))); v16si ary(signed char a) { return v16si{a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a,a}; } Compiled with g++-4.9 -m64 -O2 -fomit-frame-pointer -Wall -I$HOME/dev/common -mssse3 -std=gnu++11 -S xmm_test.C I get pxor %xmm1, %xmm1 movd %edi, %xmm0 movl %edi, -12(%rsp) pshufb %xmm1, %xmm0 ret Note the unnecessary spill of edi, with gcc-4.8 this does not happen, so you may consider this a regression. I think this may happen because it first tries to move from gpr to xmm via the stack, but later optimizes to a direct gpr to xmm move, but the stack spill stays. When using -march=corei7-avx and 4x4 int vector, gcc-4.9 uses store to stack and vbroadcastss instead of movd and pshufd $0, %xmm1, %xmm0 used by gcc-4.8, again gcc-4.8 seems better to me. But even gcc-4.8 goes through the stack in that case with -mtune=generic