Greg Jandl to SDL I did some digging, and I think I've found a better solution. By including some additional .m4 macros in the acinclude directory (http://www.gnu.org/software/autoconf-archive/ax_check_compiler_flags.html, http://www.gnu.org/software/autoconf-archive/ax_gcc_archflag.html and http://www.gnu.org/software/autoconf-archive/ax_gcc_x86_cpuid.html) then using the patch below (same as previous patch + one line change to configure.in), SDL will build correctly out of the box. The arch can then be overridden by --with-gcc-arch=<arch> (most will probably want to build with i686 there for general distribution) or --without-gcc-arch, to disable setting the arch all together. On my Atom netbook, I get -march=PentiumPro by default, which works great, as does --with-gcc-arch=i686.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
      package="org.libsdl.app"
      android:versionCode="1"
      android:versionName="1.0">
    <application android:label="@string/app_name" android:icon="@drawable/icon">
        <activity android:name="SDLActivity"
                  android:label="@string/app_name">
            <intent-filter>
                <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
                <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
            </intent-filter>
        </activity>
    </application>
</manifest>