Just looking through the thread again...
You will tend to see a lot of R/C & L/C stuff at lower freqs and Crystal oscillators at the high end. Don't forget the ceramic resonators that are very typical in the low-high KHz. range. They often look like little yellow to orange monolithic caps or like small tubular caps. Any remote control in your house is likely to have them.
If you folks want to play with a versatile timing chip, check into LSI/CSI devices LS7210/11/12. Radio Shack at least used to sell the 7210. I designed a 150Y Device calibrator around one, allowing me to step between 12mS to 372mS in 12mS steps. They have quite a few timer,lock, & PIR chips that would be fun to play with.
As for keeping accurate time, my watch cheats. This Wave Ceptor locks into WWVB at 1AM local time to sync. The bummer is when it hasn't captured the signal for 3 days and displays 12 Noon on Mar.1.
Joe
