PIC's Everywhere!

I'm at the stage of deciding exactly which PIC MPU I should use for the temperature sensor project. There are a few absolute considerations; at least one 8-bit ADC, enough I/O ports to comunicate with the I²C EEPROM and analog switch (to power down components) and of course enough RAM and EEPROM memory to hold the software to measure, record and format the temperature data.

I want to use the least expensive and lowest pin count I can, just to make this a bit more challenging. The more popular (ie. supported) the chip the better. The final circuit is to fit inside a old 35mm film roll case. I'd like to avoid SMT packaging if possible, I don't want soldering to become a major problem. Therefore the 40-pin, and maybe the 28-pin, DIPs are too big.

You'd think this would narrow it down to only one, but it not quite that easy. The Microchip site was too much with too many options. I decided to take a look at the Jameco catalog, assuming they would limit their selection to the more popular MPUs. I was surprised, there were 128 different PIC MPUs available just in the DIP package (ignoring SOIC, SSOP, TSSOP and PLCC packages).

After examining at least eight datasheets so far my eyes feel like they about to bleed... I'll let you know when I'm down to two or three, but this might take awhile...