electrodesigns.net

I have been designing PCBs for around 8 years now. My first experience was with OrCAD 9.x. OrCAD is very powerful tool and widely used in electronics industry. However, somehow, I was a little tired of it as it seemed to me based on old technology. Working in the schematic capture section was not very easy and layout was even difficult. Components library creation could easily lead me to head scratching.

It was some 3 years back. I was really looking for a software which is easy and just does the job. One day I found Diptrace. I learned it very quickly as it was very easy. The user interface was very intuitive and seems to be a really modern interface built-in “this era”. The PCB layout was also very easy, nothing less nothing extra, just every necessary tools available there. The component and footprint library creation was also very easy. Most importantly the cost of software was affordable. It increased my efficiency and reduced the headache of PCB design.

Diptrace has very good import/export options. One of the great option is Route-> Electra/Specctra Interface-> Export Autoroute DSN and Import Autoroute SES. I use this option for complex designs to export my unrouted board to Specctra, which is a great autoroute tool, route in it and import back the SES file into Diptrace for fine tuning. This is one of the great features of Diptrace I really missed in Eagle.

There are, however, a few things which I wish could be improved.

• First is to improve the 3D viewer section. The graphics rendering should be improved to make it look more closer to the real PCB.
• Diptrace currently does not support built-in 3D object creation, which I think, can be a big bonus.
• The third and last is the back annotation. There come times when we need to design the layout first and schematic later. In this case Diptrace is not going to help you much.

All in all, Diptrace is a very good tool for beginners as well as experienced engineers. It saves times, makes PCB design an enjoyable experience and does the job which you expect from a professional designer.

PIC32MX1 and PIC32MX2 are the families of microcontrollers recently introduced by Microchip. These are the cropped down members of PIC32MX3/4/5/6/7 MCUs with lesser power (40MIPS) and lower number of pins. The chips host the same M4K core but with smaller program and data memories.
This all free, open source, very small (1.5″x2.0″) and simple board is an attempt to introduce a ready to use board for easy prototyping. It has a small SOIC-28 PIC32MX1 MCU. SOIC-28 is chosen because it’s easier to solder. The breakout pins can be soldered with standard 0.1″ male/female header to be easily used with veroboard or breadboard. Diptrace source files, a schematic in PDF format and Gerbers are there to download.

Download Files:

During my PCB design experience of around seven years, I have learnt some very simple tips to better PCB design irrespective of the EDA tool used. Here are these:

1. Use existing libraries as much as possible. Why re-invent the wheel, it saves lots of time and helps to market product quickly. Search around and you will find libraries like those hosted on this website.
2. When you design your component library, keep the pin layout as per datasheet. Often the component pin-out arrangement is difference in schematic then the real physical layout. Try to design components according to the real layout. Why? Because when you place components around that component, say an IC, you can easily copy that arrangement in your PCB layout. His will help you to better components placement hence better PCB.
3. Arrange your designed library for good reference. By this you will quickly located the parts and hence re-use the library for your future designs.
4. Arrange components on PCB as in your schematic. What components are near, to say an MCU, keep them close in layout as well. Components like coupling capacitors need to be near the ICs, they are meant to be near. This will reduce the physical length of the traces on PCB. This will also help you to understand where different parts of a “system” are located and help while troubleshooting. In-fact placing components in the PCB layout is the key to PCB design. This is the “soul” of PCB design skill.
5. Use hand-routing as much as possible. CADs are not more intelligent than human mind. Unless it is very difficult, like multi-layer PCB with dozens of ICs, use hand-routing. It will be a much cleaner and neat design at the end.
6. Keep housing of final product in mind when designing layout. Often we design PCB when no housing is decided. But at the end of the day they need to be housed. So keep mounting holes there, and better choose some readily available and simple housing and design around that. It is possible that later-on the same housing gets approved and the re-designing is avoided.

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