Tony Nixon wrote:
>
> I think I fried my first PIC last night.
>
> It was siting in a PCB running normally, but later I noticed a test LED
> was only half lit.
>
> I went to touch the 16F873 after removing power and heard a 'Tssst'
> sound as the Microchip logo got branded into the tip of my finger. I'd
> swear it was so hot, I could have lit a match off it.
>
> The bootloader failed to work after that, so I assumed it was dead, but
> after cooling off it worked again. For about 3 minutes, the PCB was
> ticking like chrome exaust pipes cooling off. Unfortunately, the PIC
> seems to run a bit warm now, so I don't think I'd trust it for work
> anymore, especially not for development when you don't need a cranky
> chip.
>
> The problem:  A floating test lead with 12VDC wiggled it's way over to a
> VCC test pin and made contact.
>
> --
> Best regards
>
> Tony


Great! Someone was just asking for a PIC chip with
the minimum functionality! ;o)
-Roman

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