8-bit or 16-bit microcontroller advice

[RacybabeUK]

I need to find specifications for a new microcontroller-based teaching board for first year degree students and am having difficulty deciding on using 8-bit or 16-bit microcontrollers. The previous teaching board used was a Z80-based microprocessor board.

The microcontroller should have software support available such as a C compiler to teach basic program instructions and to show how the register operates etc. The cost needs to be low too.

[RenegadeKing]

What was wrong with the Z80 one? There are plenty of assemblers for it. That sure teaches how the cpu instructions and registers work.

[RacybabeUK]

The main reason is that the z80 boards have become unreliable and new teaching boards are needed. I have seen some evaluation boards by Kiel but they are quite expensive. It seems that Siemens and Mororola have been taken over and no longer manufacture microcontrollers in their brand name.