+1

I also stopped doing hand-optimized assembler code with 486. With one exception - stupid M$ compiler did't optimize well for Duron's pipelines, so I hand-optimized some mmx code (video decoder), but that was just an exception.

Using assembler makes absolutely no sense for general programming, especially now we have gcc 4.7.X. You may use assembler for some specific piece of code, but still, you won't beat compiler if you don't have a sh*tload of emulators, so you can trace pipelines, branches, caches, instruction dependencies, whatnot.

@Reinob - "smooth transitions" falls in the same category as "ecosystem" if you ask me