I highly recommend the TI 2812 DSP, which does everything our robot controllers do, and more. It also has a much more robust C compiler (TI 'default code' uses pointers, structs, and arrays of pointers to functions inside structs. MCC18 barfs and causes memory corruption due to incorrect asm generation with even the simplest struct-array constructs)
Motorola chips are pretty cool too. They also have a decent C implementation.
If you've seen the Gumstix's Robostix, that's one heavy duty solution, though slightly more expensive hardware-wise than otherwise desired. If you're learning and not making mass-assembled products, however, the price tag is well worth it
. In fact, we plan to use Gumstix in First 2006 (
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...d.php?p=402247)
---NOTE:
No, I'm
NOT ripping on Microchip or their compiler. In fact, it's about the most inexpensive C chip, and for that they deserve a lot of respect. Also, I've used these chips in my other work before (where I had a full licensed MCC18 toolchain), and their tech support is very friendly and responsive at fixing problems I found with the compiler.
The only thing I'm saying, is that sometimes MCC18's C bugs and controller limitations are frustrating to a beginner programmer, so you're better off using a more robust solution to begin with.