Hello all,

It appears an application I wish to design would best be done with some kind of
PIC.  I have absolutely ZERO experience with such, however, and would GREATLY
appreciate your advice on a couple of questions:

 1) Price: Right now, things are a bit tight, so I need to know the least
    costly entre into PICdom.  This includes everything that would be necessary
    to get me started: the chip itself, support hardware, programming hardware,
    and programming software.  I have Linux, DOS, and Win95 at home, so anything
    to reduce cost by using a PC would help.

 2) Selection: How do I choose from the wide variety out there, from MicroChip
    PICs, to Parallax Basic Stamps, to who knows what else?  Keeping cost in
    mind, and knowing that I am just a beginner who's not trying to make an
    application to control every last Christmas tree bulb in Boise (or, for that
    matter any Christmas lights), how do I determine the proper PIC to use?

 3) General advice: Any other advice for a newcomer to this stuff?


aTdHvAaNnKcSe (Thanks in advance).



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