Steve,

Como ca va? Tres bien! Forgive my spelling, but your hex file loaded and works perfectly! This means that I have my programmer etc. set correctly. Just two quick questions then; a) are you using PBP 2.47? b) would you please try adding this to your USB demo program and see what happens. I placed these right after the Define OSC 48 line.

RCSTA = $90 ' Enable serial port & continuous receive
TXSTA = $24 ' Enable transmit, BRGH = 1
SPBRG = 56 ' 38400 Baud @ -0.16%
SPBRGH = 1
BAUDCON.3 = 1 ' Enable 16 bit baudrate generator

cren var rcsta.4
hserout ["Yes we have no bananas!",13]

When I take these lines back out the program compiles fine. The good news is that I've almost memorized the 18f4550 datasheet this weekend! I also tried adding this;
asm
mov w,1
movlw spbrgh
mov w,56
movlw spbrg
endasm
right after the _config portion of the program, but no luck. I'm don't do assembler, but I read Myke Predko's book, and can follow along.

Thanks again, and don't shovel too much snow!

Jerry.