Thomas:
If you were to elect to use a Cygnal Part you can get EVERYTHING you need to get started for about $99 US. For example say you picked a low end part such as the C8051F226 that has 8K FLASH, 32I/O lines, etc you could get this development kit:


Click image for link to Cygnal
...for the $99 and it includes the eval card, JTAG adaper for ISP, power adapter, CDROM with Keil tools good for C programs up to 8K (any size assembler program), and even an RS232 cable to connect the thing up to your PC. In the case of the 'F226 eval board there is a 2x32 header that pins out all signals from the board. There is also a small 8x64 area of uncommited holes on 0.1 inch centers that can be used to mount simple circuitry or connectors.

Of course with all Cygnal parts, you can use the Cygnal IDE that comes on the CDROM (or download from their web site) that lets you create projects, edit source code, compile and/or assemble code, and link to object. The IDE has provisions for supporting the ISP download of the code into the target microcontroller FLASH. The IDE then supports debugging that is almost as good as having a full emulator by taking advantage of the hardware debug circuits on the micro including hardware breakpoints and watch capture registers.

Michael Karas

PS....No I do not work for Cygnal and do not get paid to promote their products. I have worked with a number of their parts and dev kits and find the value offered to be second to none.
MJK