After some hiatus I'm back and getting reacquainted with the PIC, so be prepared for some crazy questions

First up is I have MPLAB 8.90 running on Win7 64 pro, but occasionally when building my video card locks and has to restart. Intel an Acer are both quite on this so I was thinking of going to MPLABX. What are your thoughts, is MPLABX ready for prime time?

Second up is pickit2, since the 45k20 is low power 3.5v my plan is to not power the chip from the pickit2, but apparently the 45k20 can accept the higher voltage on the programming pins. Has anyone tried this? did you blow the ass out of the 45k20?

Here is my intended connection:

 

In MPLAB you can set the supply voltage given by the PICKIT 2.

 

In MPLAB you can set the supply voltage given by the PICKIT 2.

I was able to find that in the pickit2 programmer, but not yet in MPLAB, but still looking thx for the reply.

 

If I remember correct. It is in the programmer menue

 

If I remember correct. It is in the programmer menue

I had the debugger set to MPLab sim, so once I changed that to programmer of pickit2 the 3.3v option became available thx.