[bryanthompson]

Rob, thanks for that link, they have some pretty cool stuff.

My programmer arrived a few days ago. I dusted off an old Windows machine and got it running with IC-Prog and MPLab.

Still need to get a chip and a 1:1 Serial cable, then I'll try making some simple programs for it. Just blinky lights and things for now.

has anyone used MPLab? An electrical engineer friend of mine showed the program to me a few years ago, but it looked overwhelming and like something I wouldn't ever be interested in.