Chinese #$ap!

Ok.. I'll take much of what I said about Microchip back.  I hooked my PIC32MX protoboard up though the same cable that hooks to the ICSP ZIF board.. and noticed that all of the voltages were about 1/2 of what they were when hooked directly.

I thought.. naw, 4 inches of cable can't drop that much.  So I bugged the cable.  The green pin (which I used as ground in my tests) was not properly crimped on one end of the cable!  So.. that explains the issues I had with the PIC16F871.

I crimped the pin back down with needle nose pliter and flowed solder into it on both sides (since I didn't know which one wasn't connected and obviously the insulation on one side wasn't stripped off before crimping.. so melting it and flowing with solder was the only way I could insure a good electrical and mechanical connection since I didn't have replacement pins) and now the cable is well.  I still see more voltage drop than I'd like in the charge pump (so it still sucks IMHO) but it seems that most devices will now work even with a little supply sag.  I now have a working PICKIT 3.

So there you are.  Typical Chinese crap that isn't tested before it's sent off on a month long journey.  Grade: C- at most on this for Sure Electronics.  The fact I ordered 12/23 and they didn't ship until 1/7 (according to the HK Post) and then it had a defective cable with it would definitely make me think twice about buying from them again.

I bought most of my 0805 chip caps from them in an assortment previously.  They are fine.. all I've measured were accurate.. but it took over three weeks to get those too.  Most Chinese sources on E-bay are much faster.  having a defective test cable really sucks though.  I can't get back those three hours of my life!

So there you are.  Now that I have it working it's probably better than the real thing (since the ZIF socket thing isn't an option from Microchip and the assortment of cables is nice too.. when they work...).. but they obviously don't test the stuff before they ship, so you are taking a risk you'd wouldn't for $20 more with the real thing.