At 09:28 AM 11/28/98 -0500, you wrote:
>what is the best way to get power consumption down yet still increse clock
>speed....
>it seems that the clock generating devices use more power then the pic!!!!
>
>

That is the $5000 question.  Seriously though, if you want to make a pic
run fast you pay the price in power consumption.  That is the inherent
nature of ANY CMOS device.  The power (and current) consumed is
proportional to the square of the frequency.  This is because...
internally, every clock requires the CMOS gates to charge/discharge all of
the internal capacitances (eg. distributed capacitances of interconnecteds,
 CMOS gate capacitance, etc.)  This requires current.

However, if you can arrange it so that you PIC only needs to run for short
intervals.  Then you can put the device to SLEEP when it is not needed.
This will reduce the AVERAGE power consumption compared with keeping the
PIC awake all of the time (idling).  In sleep mode, the PIC shuts down the
oscillator circuit.  No clock.... means not current consumption (except
leakage currents).     Keep in mind that it takes a little time for the PIC
to restart the oscillator after SLEEPING.  Check out the docs for more
information.

So... it can be done... and it can't be done!

Cheers,
Don