ESP32 is great... that is if you need wifi capabilities.
If you need just a compact, low power MCU, I use TI MSP430, Atmel ATmega, and STM32 MCUs. With these three I have a very wide field covered.

 

Back to the original point.
I would really like to recommend the NXP LPC15 series, but there's no point in my doing so, because they're out of stock - I'm being quoted delivery dates of August 2022.
I'm currently changing to the Renesas devices, but I have not used them for long enough to be able to recommend them.

 

For my tinkering lately I've found the 18f24q10 to be low cost and effective. I have a project in the works using the configurable logic cells of the 18f45q10 to almost eliminate all programming other than communication, setup, and a few other things. I don't know if they all are set up this way (J series), but I found out the hard way on an 18f87j50 if you are using EC mode for the clock it will always output a clock signal on RA6. You can't set it to I/O like most others. Unfortunately I had it connected to the enable pin of my oscillator and spent several hours trying to figure out why everything seemed erratic until it finally made sense.
The ESPs are nice, but I don't think you can get the same interrupt timing you can with PICs and ASM... I haven't tried or looked into it too deep I have to admit though.

 

For my tinkering lately I've found the 18f24q10 to be low cost and effective. I have a project in the works using the configurable logic cells of the 18f45q10 to almost eliminate all programming other than communication, setup, and a few other things. I don't know if they all are set up this way (J series), but I found out the hard way on an 18f87j50 if you are using EC mode for the clock it will always output a clock signal on RA6. You can't set it to I/O like most others. Unfortunately I had it connected to the enable pin of my oscillator and spent several hours trying to figure out why everything seemed erratic until it finally made sense.
The ESPs are nice, but I don't think you can get the same interrupt timing you can with PICs and ASM... I haven't tried or looked into it too deep I have to admit though.

Not in my hands yet.
Can't you define that with CONFIG?

 

Can't you define that with CONFIG?

Normally yes, but the option isn't even available on that family. Internal clock you can set RA6 to IO, but not external clock mode. It was to easy to assume based on the others I have played with. It really is not that big of a deal. I just thought I would attempt to save some headaches.