This book is a hands-on guide to microcontrollers. Reading about microcontrollers is fine for reference or as an introduction to microcontrollers. But for the motivated reader that really wants to learn about microcontrollers, you have to have both hardware and software. Emulators usually cost too much for the non-professional so the challenge is to provide a cost effective system that allows software to be written quickly and tested on hardware.

Of course it is just fine to study along as the projects are developed learning C along the way. One step up from that is to get a PIC16F876 with a bootloader programmed in it and prototype it on a breadboard with a RS232 chip. This can be purchased from Digikey for around $15 or depending on shipping and might require an hour or 2 to build.

There are numerous PIC boards available (try a Google search) but the PicWiser is recommended. Now we need to get our tools ready to go.