Hello People!

First of all, Happy New Year! I seem to remember bring this topic up before many moons ago, but I thought I'd bring it up again, just to see what people think of the Philips XA Range.

I was originally thinking of using an XA in an application because it involved a lot of fixed-point number crunching, and to do it in 8-bit would have been a real hassle to program, not to mention pretty slow.

When I started to look into using an XA, it because obvious that I would need to splash out on even more development kit. Obviously because the XA is Philips own Propritary design, it requires a new assembler etc... luckily I can use external program memory, so I can use my existing EEPROM burner (built by me!). Philips seem to have gone down the profit making route of charging for the assembler, and apart from the data sheets (which aren't too bad actually), there is very little documentation on the XA.

I guess for most of you (I'm assuming the majority of you work for companies that buy the kit you need), buying the assembler, simulator etc. isn't too much of a problem. But for me, the poor, unfunded hobbiest (who wishes he had a job in embedded-control design), I cannot afford the kit. Infact most the stuff I use is home built (programmers, programming software etc.)

What I want to know is, is the XA worth investing any money into? Does anyone know of any free development kit for it? Does anyone have experience using the XA, and what do they think of it?

Are there any other 16-bit (or higher!) 8052-like devices on the market suitable for the hobbiest (ie ones that can actually be soldered to a board without the aid of a tunneling-electron-microscope), and preferably with no more that 68 pins!

Basically I am looking for the microcontroller ideal that we all want.. fast as possible, cheap as possible, powerful as possible, and as easy to use as possible!!!. but then I doubt I'm the only one searching for a such a thing!

I'm interested in getting other people involved in the project I'm working on at the moment, so I will post another subject onto this message board fairly soon describing what I am doing. Getting some funding for the project would be lovely, but I guess I'm pushing my luck asking for that!!!

Thanks for taking the time to read this rather long, and badly phrased posting. I will greatly appricate any help or advice you may be able to give me.

Cheers,

Matt Bucknall