My GQ-4X had been reporting configuration failures while I was trying to program PIC12F629s for PlayStation modchips.

So I tried something simpler.

I programmed one with a tiny LED-blinking test instead.

That worked.

This is useful as a sanity check, but it does not prove that the earlier modchip failures were caused by the PIC code or the chip itself.

I was dealing with several overlapping problems around this time, including an increasingly unreliable programmer and a faulty CD burner being used to make test discs.

The good news is that the PIC12F629 is Flash-based and reprogrammable, so repeatedly getting things wrong is considerably less expensive than doing the same thing with one-time-programmable chips.

Here’s the result, accompanied by some 1990s nostalgia and lunch.

Because apparently microcontroller diagnostics require Pizza Pockets.

Sources