PIC further

The basic PIC microcontroller 16F84 is enough for many applications. But if you happen to be confined to its limitations like RAM and happen to spend lots of time optimizing your firmware for low memory usage it is worth going for PIC18F series. 18F series is around twice as costly as 16F. Other than cost no any disadvantages or difficulties.
I could find 18F452 in local market for 550 rupees. Use Microchip MCC18 compiler and ICProg with JDM version 2 self made programmer. Later I switched to WinPic Pro programmer that supports JDM serial programmer.
WinPic Pro is extremely faster than ICProg. Moreover you can configure WinPic pro to program any PIC MCU.

MicroControllers & PIC

Sometime back I started to refresh my knowladge on Microcontrollers. In undergraduate age I had only learned

What is a micro controller?

But haven't had a chance to use one. Once I found an ATMEL 80C51 but did not have a programmer to program it. After several attempts I gave it up. Anyway that age is gone.

Some time back I heard that PIC microcontrollers by MicroChip are the microcontrollers to go for today's designs. I asked people,

Why should we go for PIC? What is special about PIC?>

Today I found the answers myself. PIC are,
1. Available in local market.
2. Best features for price (Flash program memory, RAM, Other advanced features too)
3. Maximum support and help available in the internet.

I made the well known JDM serial programmer and used ICProg to program PIC 16F84 :) . Used Hitech PICC Lite C compiler with Microchip IDE to write and compile the "C" program. Cool.. after 2-3 hours I became familiar with everything and circuit(s) worked without any problem.

Experience and Fun well worth the time and money spent..