I have 89C420 samples too. I can't program them yet, though...

I often hear from people that are running applications on microcontroller boards with a BASIC interpreter. They are wondering whether to rewrite parts (or all) of the software in C or assembly, or purchase a BASIC compiler, all because the system works great, but is "Not quite fast enough." I plugged in the 89C420 in a board with EA strapped low and ran a simple BASIC benchmark program. It ran about 2.2 times as fast. I expected more speed gains, but since the BASIC interpreter spends most of its time reading from memory (both code and xdata in my case), the chip is mostly in "Standard 8051 mode." I repeated the test with a Winbond 77E58, and got similar results. And this from a part costing less than half of the Dallas chip, plus I can actually program it!

-- Tom Bachmann