Schematic & PCB Design Software

Hello Everyone . Seems to be a lot of PCB Layout / Schematic "Freeware" all over the internet . Here are just a few examples :

1. XCircuit [freeware]
2. Auto-Trax eda lite 3.04 [freeware]
3. PCB Artist 1.0 [freeware]
4. Diptrace v 1.5 [freeware]
5. PCB eagle pro. [freeware]

I only spent one hour searching and there is more Freeware out there !!........Later on I will add some more to the list  .
HH..... .....Regards..........Eugene



 

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		Quote:			Posted by goldigger
	Eugene52; I downloaded the expressPCB aqnd pad2pad. I have tried twice, to make the expressPCB stuff work, but it is UN-intuitive and I can not find any explicit directions! I am used to stuff that is easy to make work... this is NOT. The pad2pad, I made two board drawings, last nite and this afternoon, it has quirks but I can make a single side pattern, in no time. The ONLY real problem is.... it is ONLY surface mount, where components are involved. Pad2pad has a legal document that would choke a goat! For curiosity, I made a tone decoder/PLL board (one IC) and a power supply design for the guy,s 2 tube metal locator. The PLL cost out at just about $300, to produce one board and the inverter was nearly $400!!!! Of course I would make my own boards. But they were the neatest little surface mount gizmos..... 2 in by 3 inch! goldigger (Brian)

Hello goldigger . True !! I think most PCB / Schematic software is not user friendly at all . One software I tried a few months ago had 20 different resistor sizes , 30 different capacitor sizes , not necessary for what I need . All I need is a simple "Through Hole" design not surface mount . Standard board not metric , 2 sided "very simple" . Most PCB software seems to be reverse engineered in Hong-Kong    !!! ..........I am not worried right now , I have a little spare time [2 weeks] and I know I will find something Great and I will let everyone here know what is good to use , "Free" and user friendly !!! 
HH and Best Regards........Eugene


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Golddigger,
If you have problems downloading it, I could zip it up and get it to you, hopefully that would work.
email address is mdiede57@cox.net
let me know if I can help

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mdiede57;

Problem solved.... thanks. I had upgraded my FireFox to 3.5.n, a few days ago and apparently it messed with my security settings.... they were RIGHT AT THE TOP!

So, I restored same, to low, because I work through 2 firewalls, already, and voila.... la programme.

Before, it had zero bytes, after, the download was OK.

I have been playing with the pad2pad, it is very intuitive, so I never had to read instructions, but the expressPCB has very archaic symbols and poor, if any instructions, in short, I cannot do more than drop an IC on the palette, then I cant move it!

I have made 5 board designs, in 2 days, with pad2pad, 2 of which were surface mount. I saved the design, with all parts, then I deleted the parts, 1 by 1, leaving designations, and saved the bare board design.... with a new name, of course. It works OK, that way.

I looked at the saved program, with note pad... it looks like nothing I ever saw before... you can always tell a gif, jpeg or most others, even PDF by the first few characters. I Have recently been getting downloads that have JPG endings but will not open.... a peek shows they are jpeg, yes, but jfif... change it and they open fine.

The problem may be the Firefox update, again.

I am going to look at some of the other pcb stuff, as I have decided I need one that will convert all board designs to a standard format, such as a GIF or JPEG, so I can transport my design, to a good, laser printer, without needing the program, on that computer.

Barring that, I need a small program to send files, over the wireless link, to print!

goldigger (Brian)


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mdiede57;

Well, unless you have a simple, intuitive piece of freeware for making 1 or 2 sided PC boards, that will convert the image to GIF or Bit Map...it doesnt HAVE to have schematic capture but that would be an asset.

I have dark room experience and photo-sensitized boards sound good to me, even tho you dont need a dark room, of course, just kind of similar.

I have been playing with computers since the Altair, and slightly before, but to makeum computer magic work... got to have right attitude and hold face JUST right! Kind of like dowsing.

Ive been kind of stuck in the DOS darkness, Ive had this XP Emachine, since they first came out but could not set it up because of spacial restrictions and net access. Both problems have semi-resolved, and then I got this lap top. I have PLUNGED, directly, from windows 3.1n to XP, I totally missed 95, 98, 2000, and ME! XP is like 3.1, enough that I have had NO major problems. Except, I think my 3.1n was a bit more stable.

I have had no email access for about 8 yrs, so getting used to it again has had to be swift!  Then there is Google Earth.... I did not have that on the 3.1n machine.

I have been spending about 12 hrs a day on this computer! Time for a break.

goldigger (Brian)

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