this post was submitted on 15 May 2024
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C compilers (at least on personal computers) weren't great at optimization back then and every kilobyte mattered - the user only got 640 of them, going beyond that required jumping through hoops.
Similar for MHz, hand optimization was important for performance since there was so little CPU time to go around.
And also legacy... If something is already written in assembly and you want to add a feature, you're not going to completely rewrite it.