Quote Originally Posted by picnaut
If I were you Rob, I would direct my question toward former (or even current) PBP users who are now using Proton primarily. Especially those who have converted large PBP programs to Proton. Find out what their experiences have been.
I'm happy to relate my experiences with MBasic, PicBasicPro and Proton.

I had a large Basic Micro ATOM program that filled a PIC16F877. The BasicMicro tools had all the extensions and modifiers I needed but I had a lot more coding to do on my aviation related instrumentation project, and it did not support PIC 18F parts with the larger code space.

I bought PicBasicPro which does support the larger 18F devices, and ported the entire program over from MBasic in about 3 evenings, including the clumsy hoops I had to jump through to get PicBasicPro to handle the strings, 32-bit integer math, and byte arrays. I really didn't like the lack of 32-bit integer math, the poor string and array handling.

I stumbled on the Proton Development Studio website, downloaded and read the manual, haunted the Proton forum for a week, and decided to buy the PDS v3 package.

I had the entire PicBasicPro program, which originally filled a PIC18F877, completely ported over to Proton and running in 1.5 evenings. The excellent error handling made it a snap to spot the syntactical differences, and it even made altenative suggestions for command usage.

The Proton tool suite offers outstanding string handling, 32-bit math, and byte array handling, it offers much more than ALL the competition in the way of LCD and compact flash card extensions (just fer instance), and the standard manual BLOWS AWAY ALL the competition.

Don't look now BasicMicro and MELabs, but Crownhill Proton Development Suite is way out front. No, I don't work for Proton. I'm just happy that after spending the money I have on all 3 packages, that I finally have a tool that doesn't leave me wanting for more.

BasicMicro and MELabs have gotten "tired" and allowed the new "kid in town" to lap them. Congratulations to Proton and shame on BasicMicro and MELabs.