Hi Malcolm,
I take it you are loading your PIC with the compiled examplefiles provided by mikroE with the boards, correct? If so I'd say I say it's quite important that you have the correct x-tal speed otherwise all the timing calculations etc will be off. This MIGHT not matter for the actual SPI communications (at least not if running slower) but it WILL for sure when it comes to communicating with the PC over the PICs USART.

Now, I looked at the example files for the microSD card and it looks like it's s written for 8Mhz oscillator and 19200 baud. The comments say 8Mhz HS-PLL so I'm not sure if it's actually 8Mhz or if it's 32Mhz.

If you have a 4Mhz x-tal you MIGHT be able to run it if you set the baudrate in the terminal software to 9600. By the sound of you've already tried that but in case you haven't.... Then of coarse you must set all the DIP switches correctly but I'm sure you have that covered.

I have a PICPLC16 board which have the serial ethernet "module" on board. I'm very interested in what you might come up with, codewise, when it comes to that. It should be doable in PBP but I don't think it's an easy task.

Keep us posted!
/Henrik.