I've had a project inquiry with the requirement to provide documentation in Diptrace format.
Anyone here using it?
Comments?
Thanks! ...Jim Thompson
-- | James E.Thompson | mens | | Analog Innovations | et | | Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus | | San Tan Valley, AZ 85142 Skype: Contacts Only | | | Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat | | E-mail Icon at
I'm looking for work... see my website.
I use it. I like it. The licenses have pin limits and not board size limits like eagle, so the low cost versions are way better for anything that isn't a break-out for some new single chip thing
Only a brief eval.
You could try reading about it / asking on eevblog
-- John Devereux
Unless you're really stuck for work don't waste your time.
Potential profitability. ...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson | mens |
| Analog Innovations | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| San Tan Valley, AZ 85142 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |
I'm looking for work... see my website.
I've heard nice things about Diptrace. Main drawback ISTM is a smaller user community than Eagle, but folks who use it like it.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
-- Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics 160 North State Road #203 Briarcliff Manor NY 10510 hobbs at electrooptical dot net http://electrooptical.net
That's what I'm finding. The potential customer is seeking design of analog modules (off-the-shelf components) with direct drop-in to DipTrace PCB Layout. (Consumer-grade two-layer boards fab'd in China.)
...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson | mens |
| Analog Innovations | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| San Tan Valley, AZ 85142 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |
I'm looking for work... see my website.
If you have the time just try it out. They have a 30-day trial and also a smaller free version for non-profit use.
Occasionally when on-site at clients I have to work with whatever CAD they have and it's not that tricky. Except when the menues are in a language that I don't understand well.
After not liking Orcad anymore I switched to Eagle and was surprised how many smaller companies in the US are using it, too.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/
Yep. Fortunately Cadence/OrCAD and their ilk are really clever at shooting themselves in the foot >:-}
Even the pissy-Spice variants in free circulation aren't too bad. ...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson | mens |
| Analog Innovations | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| San Tan Valley, AZ 85142 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |
I'm looking for work... see my website.
I just hope AutoDesk doesent muck up Eagle.
Cheers
Amen!
They probably will. I've lost track of the name, but there was once an easy-to-use graphics program that Autodesk scooped-up and f...ed over :-(
The biggest scoop-up-and-f...-over company is Adobe... even worse than Micro$hit. ...Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson | mens |
| Analog Innovations | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| San Tan Valley, AZ 85142 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |
"We are a nation of laws"
Which is double-speak for...
"We are a nation of yellow-belly wusses"
Yeah. OTOH if they do I will just hang on to my V7 license for many years. I had done that with 4.16 because Cadsoft didn't understand the need to hierarchical schematics and now does, which is why I bought.
I did the same with Orcad, hung on to my SDT license (DOS) for more than a decade after they were bought. I found the statibility of the Windows version not to my liking so I switched to Cadsoft.
One recent change with Eagle that I don't understand and that is IMHO a poor business decision is that they abandoned the schematics-only versions:
While I have the whole package with layout and autorouter I essentially never do layouts. It is more cost-efficienct to my clients to farm that out and besides, other people need to make a living as well. There are many engineers who also work like I do and they only need schematic capture. Afterwards it gets condensed into a netlist and sent to the layouter.
It's almost like being made to buy a travel trailer with your new car even though you never go camping. Makes no sense to me.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/
That's great if you don't need to convey special requirements to them. For example, which traces will need to be wider because of current, or separated from all others because of voltage, have some defined Zo, or many other factors? Do you spend your time documenting all these things for their layout? Couldn't you, as the design engineer with all the gotchas already in your brain, do it better and faster yourself?
Just curious how you manage to work with them. I have been forced into the layout scene and I am not good at it. It takes me much too long. I would love to be able to farm it out if possible.
Thanks.
Easy: It's done in the module spec. There will be schematic snippets with "graffiti" on some traces, along with instructions such as "keep the red loop short", "rate the blue net section for 3 amps", "amber is noise sensitive" and so on. MS-Paint is an excellent tool for doing that.
Absolutamente! The module spec and layout instructions are always growing concurrently with the schematic. I am a firm believer in good documentation from the project start, not just as an afterthought.
No. Even if I could it would still cost more than the layouter.
The trick is to develop a good rapport with a layouter, learn each other's quirks, how to live with them, and then work together. My local layouter and I go back more than 20 years. Whenever I have a layout coming up he is the first person I ask and I only venture to other layouters if he doesn't have time. He has an engineering background and we have done many noise-critical layouts together so a lot of things don't even need to be discussed anymore.
He uses an older version of PADS and then we "ping-pong". He sends me a PADS file, I check placement or layout steps using PADS Viewer, then I start a numbered list with change requests and send it back to him. That goes on another 5-10 times and only after the last check on my part does he have to generate Gerbers. As we go along the list is extended and items that have been taken care of are deleted. I never use an item number twice so there cannot be a mix-up. It's almost like clockwork. Yet we haven't had a face-to-face meeting in around 20 year. He is on
30mi away. One of these days I am going to visit for a coffee or maybe do a really long bike ride, just to see which of us looks oldest :-)If you are in need of a good layouter and are ok with him being in Sacramento drop me a line.
[...]-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/
Yep. My chip layout guy and I have been working together since
1999... and he's in Columbus, Ohio ;-) Never had a single problem with his layouts... but then I annotate heavily as well......Jim Thompson
--
| James E.Thompson | mens |
| Analog Innovations | et |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems | manus |
| San Tan Valley, AZ 85142 Skype: Contacts Only | |
| Voice:(480)460-2350 Fax: Available upon request | Brass Rat |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com | 1962 |
I'm looking for work... see my website.
I appreciate your in-depth answer, Joerg. My problem is that I don't have the time to generate lists of changes and wait for a 5-10 times ping-pong. The process you describe feels like it might take weeks or more. Since you are already doing this, I must assume it is more expedient for you in your environment, but I don't think it will work for me.
Many thanks for your reply.
I agree, a schematics only license. We do that with our board guy. Draw up the sch and send that and the footprints out. He's in Florida and has 99% of our TH footprints. I tend to do newer SMT stuff in eagle. It is time consuming but once the footprints are made then it's all routing.
Cheers
That's awesome, I mostly do my own layout. which is a total time sink, I like the spacial layout puzzle part of it... where it really pays to know what nodes are important. But then more than
1/2 my time is spent moding parts libraries, and making sure all connectors/ holes / cutouts are in the right place. (And not put in backwards or on the wrong side.)George H.
The most recent layout with some RF stuff and a switch-mode converter on there was this week and took about two work days from start to Gerbers. I could not have done it any faster. Some of the unavoidable delays are caused by me because of "extracurricular" activities (lay caregiving for our church) but that would not go away if I did the layout myself.
Another upside in using a layouter is that they are usually intimately familiar with what board houses and SMT assemblers can and cannot do these days. That can get intricate, such as heat profiles during reflow.
-- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/
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