Question to Altium Protel users

GroupDIY Audio Forum

Help Support GroupDIY Audio Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Ilya

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 25, 2005
Messages
751
Location
Moscow
Here's something for you, Protel guys.
I'm using Altium DXP package with Protel. And here's what I can't understand how to do.
Let's say I have 2 completely different circuits (schematics + pcbs) which are fine and pass DRC and all.
Now, I need to merge these 2 boards on one big PCB and I want to do it myself 'cause the manufacturer charges extra $$$ for doing this.
And here's the problem. If I just copy/paste these 2 pcbs onto another big pcb I'm getting errors like "short circuit", cause this new pcb doesn't have the correct netlist (in fact, the netlist is blank).
If I create sheets from those 2 schematics and put them on a new sheet in a new project then I get duplicated designators and net names (for ex. if I have resistor R1 in both circuits I'll get 2 nets named "R1_1"). The obvious solution is to change designators which I don't want to do (and besides I don't know how to change them all at one time, for ex. adding prefix or suffix).
Is there any workaround here? Or should I export to CAM and do all this stuff in CAMtastic?
Any suggestions will be really helpful!
 
i dont know protel but once i merged the 2 gerber files for the gssl comp, so manufacturing was cheaper. factory was charging almost twice just for being 2 separate files....

i´ve done that in GerbTool

Just imported both sets of gerbers and exported them as a single file, but i think you need to position your 2 boards as if they are together, i mean, imagine having both so one of them is next to the other, so when you import them in the CAM program they do not overlap.
 
You can import a board using the "paste special" command in the slightly older Protel I'm using. It allows the duplicate designators to exist.

But you can't do any design rule checking at that point, there isn't any netlist for either board, so all mods have to be done in the individual layouts and just recopied into your final "gerber master".

I think DXP works similarly.
 
Thanks for comments guys.
The thing that bothers me is that you can't do drc at that poin. Although I found out that on Designer 6 you can do panels for fabrication in the pcb editor, and this problem is solved. I think I'll upgrade my old dxp 2004 to designer 6.
 
I found the same thing - so I generate the gerbers after pasting, then manually verify (by loading the gerbers) that the power/ground planes and polygon pours all print properly. I got bit by that once - not pasting correctly. Fortunately I caught it before sending it so now I know to do that.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top