[clarkmoody]

In this case, v is not declared mutable, so you could ignore. In fact, the compiler will probably end up assigning x = 4 at compile time.

[est31]

A better comparison is:

    fn foo_arr(v: &[u8; 5]) -> u8 {
        v[2]
    }

    fn foo_vec(v: &Vec<u8>) -> u8 {
        v[2]
    }

In the foo_arr case, the index lookup can be optimized out. In the foo_vec case, it can't be, because theoretically you might pass something with only 2 elements or less to foo_vec, and access to the third element will fail.

Same goes for e.g. the slice::windows vs slice::array_windows functions. In windows, you get a slice in the closure, and while the size is guaranteed by the implementation, without there being inlining the optimizer doesn't know about this guarantee. With array_windows, this size guarantee is communicated.