Well, Erik, you may have a point.

Depending entirely on where you buy things and what you buy, a wire-wrapped 805x board can be either more costly or less so than a commercially manufactured development board. IIRC, the SILABS board costs about $100, plus freight. COnsidering what it is, that's probably not bad.

If you want to build your own board with an in-circuit programmable MCU, you have to have a few components and the board itself. You also need a few connectors. This is not free stuff unless you get it as samples from the manufacturer, and that's not likely with a wire-wrap board.

One ground-planed ~ 4.5"x 5" (made by Vector) wire wrap board that I've occasionally used costs about $18US. There are others of course. You'd need a socket for the MCU, which probably would be happy in a 40-pin DIP socket. You'd need a 16-pin DIP socket for a MAX232A. You'd need a 14-pin socket for a crystal oscillator or for a 74LS04, wired as I've often suggested, to replace a crystal oscillator, AND you'd need a 14-pin DIP socket and a 14-pin "component carrier" (I think that's what DigiKey calls 'em) so there's a place for passives. If you use additional components, they'll need sockets, too. That should cost about $8US. Of course, there's also the cost of the components. That could also be as much as $8US. I doubt anyone would attempt to wire-wrap a circuit if he didn't already have the means to do so, just as I doubt anyone would attempt building a kit if he didn't already have a DVM, soldering iron, solder, and a power supply.

Now, the board I recommend for people to use if they want to "play" with 805x, is the New Micros NMIY-0031, cosing about $40US. It doesn't offer a programming circuit for ISP MCU's, but it doesn't use internal memory either. There are lots of boards out there. The O/P wants to build something though, despite the fact he first asked for board recommendation.

Wire-wrapping your own board is about the same (US$30-50) in cost as buying that NMIY-0031 board, which has lots of features. The $100 SiLabs board has fewer "features," but much more MCU. It's a tradeoff.

RE