However the very name "simulator" makes it possible to be led astray. There may, indeed, be cases where I should overcome my aversion to simulators (e. g. timing measurements) but as the proverb states "burnt child shy fire".

Agreed. Surely your past experience has something to do with your current aversion to simulators. And if you have an emulator that you like and works for you, obviously an emulator is best.

That said, I've only used a Ceibo emulator because it was provided to me for a certain project. In that project I had to use a certain I/O line--I think it was P3.7. The thing refused to work and I was sure my code was right. A little more reading of the manual showed that P3.7 was reserved by the emulator and couldn't be used. So we had to modify the proto hardware and I had to modify my code so that if the code was to be run on the emulator that the code would use P3.6 and if it was the "real thing" it would compile using P3.7.

So I've been burned, too, but the other way. :)

I guess it's not just using the right tool that matters, but also being quite familiar with the tool you've selected to know its limitations.

Craig Steiner