Ok I'm starting this thread to aswer my questions and hopefully this will turn out well enough to become an Article.

So heres what some of us start with, our first problems when starting with PIC's.
Usually its not code that causes our first problems, it sometimes is the software that interfaces with our chip to load our HEX file onto the chip. There are so many out there and each one has its own settings and nameing conventions. I blew a dozen chips before realizing I had to set the occilator of the chip up in code or by a drop down setting in the software to use the internal OCC. I didnt have any crystals at the time so I picked PICs that could run without crystals. but I thought that they just worked with my code... little did I know....
I started out by getting a $25 PIC programmer off eBay, its a K-149 kit. you could get it in a kit or preassembled. I bought the one already built. I hooked it up to the computer and pluged in a chip, dropped the chip selector down and selected my chip. wonderfull it even shows how to place the chip in the ZIF socket. but then hey, im lost it has these things for HEX files, and fuses. and geze im getting confused already, there is no manual for this software that I got, and all the books I had on PICs didnt mention how to run this software.. needless to say I got bored quickly and put off messing with PICs for 2 years. Untill one day I got a project book for PicBasic Pro... WooHoo, it looked just like Basic for the PC, which I knew. I got interested again.. now I had sample programs, and I fumbled through getting a IDE to work, I have mikrobasic, MPIDE, and microcode studio. I settled for the last as it was easiest for me, but everyone is different. so I compiled my first code "led blinky" i beleive this is everyones first... made a HEX file, opened my programmer software, loaded my hex file, and hit program...

Woo Hoo, no errors and the light blinked... I hit read from chip to make sure.. great its there, took it out pluged it into my breadboard, hooked it up just like the binky article said, and NOTHING HAPPENS... And OUCH.. that chip is HOT.. well that put me off for about another month. However Im a bit stubborn...

I found that there is a box that says FUSES on my programming software, when I looked it had just a few settings, one called OCC, there it was a setting called XT,HT, RC.. something like that anyways. Well coming from an electronics background, i knew XT usually ment crystal, I didnt know what HT was and from what I read I was confused about RC, I figured that was Realtime Clock... Doh!

I tryed all the settings but it took 4 chips blowing before I got the Internal clock set right, then Whammo! It worked... I was elated, and my PIC programming was just getting started.

I was fine using a 12F629 for a little while (I got some samples from microchip, and the programmer came with one) but I had to try others, in comes the 16f629, more pins, about the same as a 16F84 chip with internal clock. so all my books with 84's code shoud work, but a whole new problem. my fuse popup window now has dozens of settings and my clock names are differnt. I blew about 8 more chips before i got worked out to turn WDT off, MCRE off, Brownout off, and set the OCC to internal. and ignore all the other settings.

Now thats what Ive been doing for the last few years, but its annoying, as everytime I load a hex file all the fuses are reset to default values, so if i program a chip 50 times in a day, even thought its the same chip... I have to change settings of those fuses 50 times.

NOW ENTER this forum. I browse around, see some good code, see some bad code... and then i see 2 things that interest me, first it looks like the ability to insert ASM code difectly into a pic basic pro code block (but thats for later), and something that looks like this..

#CONFIG
__config _CONFIG1, _FOSC_INTOSC & _WDTE_OFF & _PWRTE_OFF & _MCLRE_OFF & _CP_OFF & _CPD_OFF & _BOREN_OFF & _CLKOUTEN_OFF & _IESO_OFF & _FCMEN_OFF
__config _CONFIG2, _WRT_OFF & _PLLEN_ON & _STVREN_OFF & _BORV_25 & _LVP_OFF
#ENDCONFIG

I just copied this from a post today, now that looks like my fuses settings, in some of my links I saved for different projects online they have some of these listed at the top of there code but its not inside a #config they look like this

__config _CONFIG1, _FOSC_INTOSC & _WDTE_OFF

which when I tried to include that awhile back only ended up with eerors so i always left that out.

So now that Ive learned to make "Includes" for some of my code that never changes, I think I would like to tackle adding the Configs. but need a little help. Currently I have over 200 PICs, of about 20 different models, however I have gotten used to using just 2 as my main chips, a 12F683 (ADC+PWM in a 8pin pack), and a 18F4550 (cause its a hoss, just about every option available). I do use others from time to time but these 2 are favorites. I dont understand the _config_config1 and the _config_config2 is this just incremented to continue adding configs, or is there a limit to how many items a config1 can hold, where do I get a list of the configs at do i have to have all the configs listed or can I just do a couple and leave the rest? is there a list somewhere and there definitions? I am lost on setting up these, I may appear as an idiot but we learn by making mistakes and boy do i like to learn ... hehe.

I am sure its not that hard to do but I need to stop wateing time trying this or trying that and start getting on to this is the propper way to do it to begin with and this is what each setting means rather than making 2-10 attemts at each setting, or not knowing the spelling of s setting to work. , I am going to instert a picture so that some can see what we run up against for those that code everything or have never seen a fuse page. not sure if anyone hasnt. Ive been doing PICs for 4 years now and up to 2 weeks ago had no help, forums or mentors other than a few articles online and a pic basic pro project book. so please forgive anything that seems idiotic to the readers knowlege.

Name: Programmer.png Views: 2586 Size: 55.3 KB this is the programmer screen, I know it may look like some other software out there, pretty much identicle but this kits software works with the kit, the kit will not work with any other programming software out there. even one that says it supports k149.
Now to show you the Fuse screen for a 18F4550

Name: Fuses.png Views: 3497 Size: 38.1 KB here is the fuse list when you hit the fuse button on the fisrt screen, please note that this list chages with the type of PIC that you choose. note the red items are what I have to chage each time I want to program a chip. so I load hex file, hit fuses, change fuse settings then hit program. I think my main problem is that the drop downs list the items with actual names not _something_...

So anyone want to take a crack at explaing #Configs and or offering referances