I started to do the site myself, I thought, how hard can it be? Even purchased a Colibri Pro license.
Well, it's a mess!
If someone submits the application form, I don't get an email so I added explicitly an email address.
I have now contracted someone and he says he'll have a new one Saturday.
We'll see ...
Jan
Well, it's a mess!
If someone submits the application form, I don't get an email so I added explicitly an email address.
I have now contracted someone and he says he'll have a new one Saturday.
We'll see ...
Jan
Hi Jan
You could consider using the Nigel Wright software pcbcad51, it’s not free but £15 is good value imo. Looks to be straight forward, imo although I have not used it. I wish something like this would have been available when I was in school. As said no free lunch, btw are you offering free lunch or some doughnuts at your seminars
?
Maybe Nigel can offer a bulk discount for student or seminar but it’s good value as it is. Could bundle in pcbcad51 with the seminar costing.
With pcbcad51 you are supporting a DIYAudio member and support would be readily available where as anything else would probably not compare since you have direct contact with the developer, that in itself is worth £15
I do wonder about how one teaches in Dutch but the software menus and help are in English, this goes for most software and web sites unless I am mistaken.
Rick
You could consider using the Nigel Wright software pcbcad51, it’s not free but £15 is good value imo. Looks to be straight forward, imo although I have not used it. I wish something like this would have been available when I was in school. As said no free lunch, btw are you offering free lunch or some doughnuts at your seminars
?Maybe Nigel can offer a bulk discount for student or seminar but it’s good value as it is. Could bundle in pcbcad51 with the seminar costing.
With pcbcad51 you are supporting a DIYAudio member and support would be readily available where as anything else would probably not compare since you have direct contact with the developer, that in itself is worth £15
I do wonder about how one teaches in Dutch but the software menus and help are in English, this goes for most software and web sites unless I am mistaken.
Rick
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Just use things like square space or similar (forgot the name of the other one, it's cheaper and works better).
It's literally drag and drop incl forms with captcha.
I would be very reluctant to teach with more obscure software.Now that I look at the web site for pcbcad51, it’s £9.99 as a download and software key, even better value, getting closer to free
Are apple and Linux support a requirement?
I say that with absolutely zero offense.
Knowing from experience, there is nothing more frustrating to have to relearn a lot of skills because absolutely no one is using that piece of software in the field.
I was trained in Ultiboard, I know it extremely well (and I wish more companies would use a similar interface, it's very intuitive). But almost nobody is using it anymore, so I had to spend a lot of time and frustration in learning something new again.
Diptrace as well as KiCAD have a very similar work flow like other programs.
EasyEDA is just so straightforward that it doesn't really matter.
I doubt if a majority would use any of these s/w packages professionally in a small to big company per say, (Diptrace, EasyEDA, pcbcad51 etc) even KiCAD, I certainly would not. Maybe in a one man show, such as my op. or Tom's op.
I can almost guarantee whatever you learn, as a start, would not be what you would be doing if you were employed as a pcb designer to do this task.
Most EE's in a big outfit do not or are not even allowed to do pcb layout for a sellable product.
The intent in this case, is ease of use, to learn from, and pcbcad51 looks simple and capable enough for the intended app.
You really do not know until you try each one out. I compare, the boys against the men, like Siemen Xpedition or Pads and Cadence Allegro even my go to, 10+ year old Orcad 16.
I could count on my hand(s) how many here have elevated their pcb design skills to use tools, at the level of Siemen Xpedition and Cadence Allegro. You use what you need to get the job done, in this case, its to learn the fundamentals of pcb layout and pcbcad51 fits the bill imo.
Every ecad has its own way to do things ( much seems obscure compared to each other ((learning curve)) , some more than others) that all result in the same thing, a pcb, if done properly. I have to change gears or re-wire my brain when I switch from one schematic editor to the other, like ltspice to orcad capture.
We'll see what Jan decides upon, I am just throwing out options for him to consider, you and others all have an opinion just like I do, usually based on what you have tried. I have been doing pcbs for a long long time now, from the tape and dougnut days to top end toolsets, so I think I have a fair bit of insight on pcb design.
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Quite some small to medium sized business use these nowadays.
I personally came across quite a few. Enough to get at least familiar with the software.
Eagle is also still used a lot, but as far us I understand, support will be dropped soon.
If that is true in the way we think it is, I would not bother putting my energy and time in there.
But my point was how transferable the skills are from one software program to another.
DipTrace basically works like (the old) Orcad, the vibe from KiCad is also similar (even Pads)
The latter having the advantage from being used by many people.
So finding tutorials or help is quite easy.
Also depending how closely you work with the 3D CAD team, but very often being able to show 3D models and ever better, export 3D step files can not even be handy, but even a must.
(exporting in 3D step files can't be done in EasyEDA btw)
I totally agree that we all have our own experiences
Which is also great about such discussions, so people can make up their own minds and we all can learn from it!
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My point is to teach or learn the pcb design fundamentals first, which is Jan's intent, which is then transferable to the toolset you decide upon or use by your employer, that meets yours or your companies needs.
I remember when I did pcb design professionally, the CCT Specctra SP55 router was a ~$50k s/w package plus 15% yearly mauntenance and that was in the 90's.
Here we are discussing the merits of a free or very low cost s/w package to learn some pcb fundamentals
DipTrace is a boy, I gave it a go once, I did not see it having similarities to orcad16. But it will do the job and is probably fine for Jan's intent.
When you or anyone else mention Orcad, please state what version you are speaking of, it's gone through 16 versions, and that was 10+ years ago, Orcad Capture is still an available and support s/w package from Cadence, but I have not compared the latest against v16 that I use.
I remember when I did pcb design professionally, the CCT Specctra SP55 router was a ~$50k s/w package plus 15% yearly mauntenance and that was in the 90's.
Here we are discussing the merits of a free or very low cost s/w package to learn some pcb fundamentals
DipTrace is a boy, I gave it a go once, I did not see it having similarities to orcad16. But it will do the job and is probably fine for Jan's intent.
When you or anyone else mention Orcad, please state what version you are speaking of, it's gone through 16 versions, and that was 10+ years ago, Orcad Capture is still an available and support s/w package from Cadence, but I have not compared the latest against v16 that I use.
Why not killing two birds with one stone if that is possible?
If you want to discuss what software to use, I think that is a important point to be taken.
Or at least investigate it.
My apologies, it was Protel 99 SE that Diptrace kinda follows. Diptrace has changed significantly over the last 5-8 years.
KiCad has a similar feel to the old Orcad. I don't have specifics (has been to long ago).
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If your designer is giving you issues, let me know.
I'll be happy to do it for you. Free.
This is my html website
ampslab
and this is using Wordpress
ampslab-spk
I'm the webmaster for both.
ESS used Diptrace to design their eval boards. Also, was told a lot of PCB manufacturers are saying they are seeing more and more KiCAD designs.
Michael, that's awfully nice of you.
I just signed a contract a few days ago, the guy does it with HTML and he says there's no problems with updates or hacking, and it should be easy for me to change/update content. I know the guy well and I trust him, although I initially questioned his HTML focus.
I'll see how it goes. It's only 4 or 5 pages anyway.
Jan
I see that some TI evaluation pcbs seem to be farmed out for design, seems they use whatever the farmers have access too or are familiar with
Like I said before, libraries are a big part to ecad, it would be advantageous for someone designing an evaluation pcb to use a common toolset such as kicad and also provide the source data such as libraries, schematics, layout in order for a customer to leverage that effort.
I have received an offer from the company who's CAD I am using more than 15 years for a bunch of free 1 year eval packages for my students.
But they will have to buy after that, or start at ground zero with another package.
Not sure that's a good solution.
It is a package I am very familiar with so no learning curve for me and I can support the students.
Thoughts?
Jan
But they will have to buy after that, or start at ground zero with another package.
Not sure that's a good solution.
It is a package I am very familiar with so no learning curve for me and I can support the students.
Thoughts?
Jan
Not a good idea.
It is like MS giving away free Office licenses to schools.
The school kits only learn how to use MS Office.
And then they have no choice but to pay license fees every year when they leave school.
You can no longer buy life-time licenses, only yearly leasing.
I shall never use Office 365 except at work.
My WinXP laptop still works perfect.
Patrick
It is like MS giving away free Office licenses to schools.
The school kits only learn how to use MS Office.
And then they have no choice but to pay license fees every year when they leave school.
You can no longer buy life-time licenses, only yearly leasing.
I shall never use Office 365 except at work.
My WinXP laptop still works perfect.
Patrick
