Can the VEX controller be programmed in assembly?

[Capt. Quirk]

I am not sure where to start.

I have plenty of experience with Parallax 8 bit SX28 & 52's, but I haven't ever worked with "C" or Pic's. So I bought Myke Predko's "123 PIC Controller experiments for the evil genius" to help get me going over the Christmas break and a VEX controller to program with.

I know I need to start with EasyC, but after that I want to use a regular IDE like MPLAB & C18 to program with. The biggest problem I see is, what Loader program would I use and how does it know which chip it's programming?



(I am planning on buying Myke Predko's "Programming and Customizing the PIC Microcontroller" after Christmas. I would like to use the VEX robot to learn more Assembly using the Pic instead of the SX, but after the competition)


Thanks

Bill