Debug Build Versus Release Build

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When you create a project using Visual C++, both a Debug and a Release version are automatically created with default options set for each.

Version Default Values
Debug version Full symbolic debugging information in Microsoft format

No optimization (optimization generally makes debugging more difficult)
Release version No symbolic debugging information

Optimized for maximum speed

Note   By using the C/C++ tab in the Project Settings dialog, you can change the debugging options for the compiler. Similarly, on the Link tab, by using the Debug Category, you can change the debugging options for the linker.

What do you want to do?

Change the default project settings for a debug build