Is std::vector so much slower than plain arrays?

Question

I\'ve always thought it\'s the general wisdom that std::vector is \"implemented as an array,\" blah blah blah. Today I went down and tested it, and it seems to

Answer 1

Some profiler data (pixel is aligned to 32 bits):

g++ -msse3 -O3 -ftree-vectorize -g test.cpp -DNDEBUG && ./a.out
UseVector completed in 3.123 seconds
UseArray completed in 1.847 seconds
UseVectorPushBack completed in 9.186 seconds
The whole thing completed in 14.159 seconds

Blah

andrey@nv:~$ opannotate --source libcchem/src/a.out  | grep "Total samples for file" -A3
Overflow stats not available
 * Total samples for file : "/usr/include/c++/4.4/ext/new_allocator.h"
 *
 * 141008 52.5367
 */
--
 * Total samples for file : "/home/andrey/libcchem/src/test.cpp"
 *
 *  61556 22.9345
 */
--
 * Total samples for file : "/usr/include/c++/4.4/bits/stl_vector.h"
 *
 *  41956 15.6320
 */
--
 * Total samples for file : "/usr/include/c++/4.4/bits/stl_uninitialized.h"
 *
 *  20956  7.8078
 */
--
 * Total samples for file : "/usr/include/c++/4.4/bits/stl_construct.h"
 *
 *   2923  1.0891
 */

In allocator:

               :      // _GLIBCXX_RESOLVE_LIB_DEFECTS
               :      // 402. wrong new expression in [some_] allocator::construct
               :      void
               :      construct(pointer __p, const _Tp& __val)
141008 52.5367 :      { ::new((void *)__p) _Tp(__val); }

vector:

               :void UseVector()
               :{ /* UseVector() total:  60121 22.3999 */
...
               :
               :
 10790  4.0201 :        for (int i = 0; i < dimension * dimension; ++i) {
               :
   495  0.1844 :            pixels[i].r = 255;
               :
 12618  4.7012 :            pixels[i].g = 0;
               :
  2253  0.8394 :            pixels[i].b = 0;
               :
               :        }

array

               :void UseArray()
               :{ /* UseArray() total:  35191 13.1114 */
               :
...
               :
   136  0.0507 :        for (int i = 0; i < dimension * dimension; ++i) {
               :
  9897  3.6874 :            pixels[i].r = 255;
               :
  3511  1.3081 :            pixels[i].g = 0;
               :
 21647  8.0652 :            pixels[i].b = 0;

Most of the overhead is in the copy constructor. For example,

    std::vector < Pixel > pixels;//(dimension * dimension, Pixel());

    pixels.reserve(dimension * dimension);

    for (int i = 0; i < dimension * dimension; ++i) {

        pixels[i].r = 255;

        pixels[i].g = 0;

        pixels[i].b = 0;
    }

It has the same performance as an array.