> 1 - Don't use MPLAB simulator - it's more trouble than it's worth.

You are making an over-arching statement that could lead people away from
what can be a very useful tool.  I've worked with many different processors,
and although I definitely have some issues with MPLAB, I think it is overall
a pretty decent tool.

> 2 - Besides that, the simulator is no darn good for simulating
>     "real-time" events, such as RS-232 or other interrupts.

I/O is one of the shortcomings of the MPLAB simulator (although this is well
addressed with the ICE-2000).  But you can get useful work done with MPLAB
for this purpose anyway.  Instead of trying to model the serial bit stream,
you set a break point where the code reads from the UART register and
substitute whatever byte value you want.

> 3 - You cannot do interrupts on the 17C44 anyways.

Exuse me!?  And where did this pearl of wisdom strike you from?  See section
5.0 "Interrupts" on page 21 of the data sheet.

> 5 - Why use a processor that no one on piclist knows anything about?

And how would you know that all 1,800 subscribers to the PIC list know
nothing about this processor?  Even then, that is a very weak reason for
picking one processor over another.  The primary source of information about
any processor should always be the data sheet.  I've never used the 17C44
myself although I have used other 17 series parts.  It took all of a minute
to look up the data sheet and verify that this processor does indeed have
interrupts as I thought.


*****************************************************************
Olin Lathrop, embedded systems consultant in Devens Massachusetts
(978) 772-3129, olin@embedinc.com, http://www.embedinc.com

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