ok that was way over my head, first it sounded like you have my PIC sending commands out, however this is a thermostat chip sending data to my PIC, there is no control that i have seen it just streams data out over and over from what i can tell. So I think im supposed to use a shiftin? as that was the only word i recognized all the rest of what you said lost me. I can build the circuit just as they have it in the picture, thankfully they have a resolution high enought for me to read the pinouts, but i could use some help on the code for that particular circuit, with the only change being that the chip I am using is a 18f4550. I did find a article that said the SDO should go to SDI and vice versa, but other than that Im lost.