In SX Microcontrollers, SX/B Compiler and SX-Key Tool, mgreen wrote: The MOC3041 is a Triac driver. It can switch small amounts of AC (like maybe 60ma), but really is intended to switch on a power Triac as shown several pages into the datasheet. There are other similar switches, generally known as "solid state switches" which include the Triac and some other components to reduce switching noise and the like. All of these use an LED as part of an optoisolator. All of these use a current roughly 5-20ma to drive the LED. Any electronics parts supplier like Jameco, Digikey, or Mouser carries lots of these in varying current and voltage capacity. Any SX pin should be able to drive such an LED using an appropriate series resistor (which depends on the power supply voltage). For a 5V supply, a 330 to 470 ohm resistor is usually used and provides roughly 8-10ma through the LED. As Bean mentioned, there are current limits for each port (group of 8 I/O pins) and for the whole microcontroller. With 10ma for each solid state switch, you could certainly control 8-10 solid state switches before starting to worry about total current draw. ---------- End of Message ---------- You can view the post on-line at: http://forums.parallax.com/forums/default.aspx?f=7&p=1&m=190196#m190596 Need assistance? Send an email to the Forum Administrator at forumadmin@parallax.com The Parallax Forums are powered by dotNetBB Forums, copyright 2002-2007 (http://www.dotNetBB.com)