As a hobbiest user of PICs I've "standardized" my boards with a 10 pin
shrouded right angle connector. The pins are on .100" centers and the shroud
provides keying if I pay moderate attention (the mating connector can be forced on
upside down with very little energy). The mating plug end is IDC and the
connectors are more or less readily available at my local elec. shops. 6 pin
connectors are hard to find surplus. For a commercial product I would probably chose
some 2mm spacing smt part from HIROSE or someone else to minimize the
footprint.

I started with a 9 pin d-shell I/F (it accomodates all of Wouters Wisp628
signals) and its robust and definitely keyed but its not .100" centered and is a
little bulky, but I/F cables were liberated from old xt motherboard machines
rs232 cable conn.

My conclusion as to why Wouter chose a 15 pin d-shell (aside from its spare
game port cable roots) is because he could route all 8 of his signals on one
side of his PCB without using a more expensive right angle DB-15, which was
clever but an overkill in my opinion. Besides its tough to emulate on a
point-to-point wired circuit...

dave.

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