I have been using solderless breadboards for a good 30+ years (yes they had= n't been around long at that time). One thing I have discovered over those yea= rs is that most people who have problems with them tend to make them far too neat= .. I have never had a problem using them, even on PIC circuits. I do know peopl= e that have had problems trying to operate at the same clock speed as ones I = have done but they were trying make the board look neat and in doing so, they pl= aced wires in parallel to each other and ended up with problems. I am assuming = the reference to "air wired" is what I use in that it means you aren't laying t= he wires down nice and neat on the breadboard but putting them "up in the air"= and going directly from point to point. I have found over the years that is th= e way to go if you want things to work on a solderless breadboard. =20 Randy Abernathy CNC and Industrial Machinery=20 service, repair, installation and=20 design 4626 Old Stilesboro Rd NW Acworth, GA 30101 Fax: 770-974-5295 Phone: 678-982-0235 E-mail:=20 randyabernathy@bellsouth.net _____ =20 From: piclist-bounces@mit.edu [mailto:piclist-bounces@mit.edu] On Behalf Of Vitaliy Sent: Thursday, January 20, 2011 2:45 PM To: Microcontroller discussion list - Public. Subject: Re: [PIC] Dumb PIC mistakes and solderless breadboards =20 Olin Lathrop wrote: >> Haven't there been threads over the years that solderless breadboards >> are evil? > > Of course, since there are always incompetent people that blame their > tools > instead of the real problem. Solderless breadboards can be quite useful. > Like any tool, they have their limitations, but those shouldn't be a issu= e > for most ordinary PIC circuits. Adjacent nodes will have some capacitanc= e > between them, but so do parallel traces on a PC board. Most of the times > a > few pF between nodes is expected and not a big deal for a well designed > circuit. If you have a very sensitive analog circuit where a pF or two > matters, then you should probably be using guard rings and the like > anyway. > > I've used these solderless breadboards many times, including for PIC > circuits with 20MHz crystals. I don't remember any problems due to the > nature of the breadboards, although I thought about the characteristics > when > building the circuits. A while back our recently hired junior engineer built a breadboard circuit to test a MOSFET switch, and it just refused to work properly. When we put = a scope on it, we found it oscillating at around 90Mhz. So we brought in an F= M radio from the breakroom, added a 10-inch piece of wire to the drain, and made the circuit into a theremin. He later air-wired the circuit, and it worked as intended (boring). Vitaliy -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist=20 _____ =20 No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 10.0.1191 / Virus Database: 1435/3391 - Release Date: 01/19/11 --=20 http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist .