High speed PCB design tools

Can anyone give recommendations for PCB programs for high speed digital design? By high speed I mean up to 10Gbps, though relatively simple boards. I've done 6Gbps in Eagle and it worked, but there was no way to verify the performance without fabbing the board and measuring it.

It looks like we have some options of:

  1. Cadence Allegro Design Authoring, Allegro PCB Designer, Allegro SI/PI, etc
  2. Cadence Allegro Designer CIS (OrCAD Capture CIS), Allegro PCB Designer, Allegro SI/PI, etc
  3. Mentor (Expedition, HyperLynx)

(Hope those are the right tools, the vendors have rather too many that are similarly-named)

Any suggestions for which to look at? This isn't a full time activity, so a tool which is easy(ier) to pick up as you go along without years of training would be handy. Cost is not an issue (academic licensing).

Thanks Theo

Reply to
Theo Markettos
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Theo Markettos wrote in news:Z8y* snipped-for-privacy@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk:

For those speeds, you'll want to use ADS (I forget the full namae) for routing and simulations. I think Expedition and Allegro can handle those speeds for 100% digital, but I know ADS can, and in analog, no one touches them a high speed stuff (analog over ~3GHz).

BTW, ADS designs can be exported to either tool, and you might plan that, because their drawing tools (fab and assembly) are trully basic, or they were a few years ago.

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Reply to
David Simpson

Thanks, I presume you mean Agilent Advanced Design System rather than any part of the Allegro alphabet soup. Looks like they have a university program, so I'll take a look.

Useful to know...

Theo

Reply to
Theo Markettos

Theo Markettos wrote in news:Z8y* snipped-for-privacy@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk:

I think so, everyone I knew just called it ADS. I do know it's neither Mentor or Cadence, or wasn't at that time.

BTW, this is VERY high end. As in, if you measure the curcuit after layout, it will then tell you what/where to trim pads (traces are done autmaticly) to get a perfect curciut.

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David Simpson

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