OT: compiling new gcc--can it coexist with old?

[Kenward Vaughan <kaynjay@igalaxy.net>]

I'm interested in trying out an Athlon-optimized gcc (www.athlonlinux.org);
this involves patching 2.95.2 and recompiling. 

The docs are not totally clear to this clueless non-programmer about the
options to use for the configure step, but I chose the following:

hpotter:/usr/local/obj# ../src/gcc-2.95.2/configure --enable-haifa
--enable-shared --enable-threads --enable-cpp --enable-cpplib
--enable-version-specific-runtime-libs
--with-gxx-include-dir=/usr/local/include --with-dwarf2 --with-stabs

where I had created /usr/local/obj for the objdir mentioned in the docs, and 
have the sources in /usr/local/src/gcc-2.95.2 (obviously, from the above).

Does this make sense? I could not make heads or tails about the other
options mentioned.  I am particularly concerned that what I create will not 
interfere with the normal gcc I wish to leave in /usr/bin.  Is there any way 
that the above will mess up the other one or its libs, etc?  

Lastly, the totally dumb question of the day is How would I use it w/o
having the other one interfere when I try compiling various package sources?

I use Debian (Woody), FWIW.  Thanks for any help!

Kenward
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