Well I got the simple version of the program running where it just toggles the P1.7 pin. Turns out that the ASCII image of the .hex file does not execute too well as an 8051 program. It turns out that the external programmer that I'm using (first use in at least 3 years) does not load files correctly into its buffer based on the load file extension. If the file selection criteria in the FileOpen dialog is set to Binary files and you pick a .Hex file it gets its ASCII loaded into the buffer instead of being interpreted into binary from the hex image.

Only when I changed the file selection criteria to "Hex Files of All Types" was the loading routine properly interpreting the .Hex file into binary and loading that into the programmer buffer.

My program still does not work correctly in the Atmel part environment but I can see signs of life. So off to some more arduous "burn-n-learn" type debug.

Michael Karas