Michael,
My experience is quite opposite. I learnt the assembly language first and then C. I prefer using assembly language over C, and even write large programs with assembly.

But for a fresher (going by his name I assume he is an Indian) knows only C, and "rudimentary" assembly language, whatever he or she does during his degree. Traditionally assembly language programs due to the atomic nature of their proceedings (a simple task which can be written as a single HLL statement can generate a few tens of assembly language code) is usually difficult for inexperienced people to understand.

As for C, agreed - its use in this particular case may not be optimal, but will yeil better and faster results. You can make less mistakes with C simply because the number of lines of code to manage is far less. Add to it faster understanding of the code. Of course I do not mean to say that assembly language programmers make more mistakes, but assembly language programs take a lot more planning than a C program.

Perhaps, it depends on the designer what he is comfortable with, lets leave it to Tejinder! LoL!

girish