PCB design software for Mac opinions

Hi all, I've looked through the Meta and Googled for some options. I'm now looking for feedback on a free or cheap (under $100) Mac PCB design software. What I'm essentially looking for is something easy to use; the learning curve on these seems to be steep. I don't need anything too complicated, two sided through plating with fairly simple circuits.

I've been giving Osmond Quartz a little bit of a try. It seems ok. Any other suggestions?

i suggest Eagle!!!

nothing comes near both in features and learning curve!
they got a version at 49 $

cheers.

That seems decent except for the 80x100mm routing area. Pretty limiting...

Also, one function that I haven't been able to fine yet on Osmond is a utility that will let me create cutouts, like for a board mounted output transformer.

I use Geda in Linux
http://www.geda.seul.org/

there is a Mac OSX version through fink:
http://www.ghz.cc/charles/fink/

But honestly I haven't tried it on Mac OSX
It is free, unlimited board size, up to 16 layers by default (can add more if wanted...), circuit simulation available etc...

not a native Mac software , but I'm very happy with Target, running under XP with Bootcamp or Parallels Desktop. Used it with Virtual PC before - which was a pain. :roll:
Since I'm a native Mac user - I haven't found any useful PCB software for Mac until now

gEDA works fine, so does Eagle. Osmond PCB from capilano is good too, but $200. The demo is fully functional, but it limits the number of pins to 700. There is also "pcb", which you can compile to run id you have Tcl/Tk installed (which is also free).

Since I'm a native Mac user - I haven't found any useful PCB software for Mac until now

Click to expand...

I use Eagle on my Mac. Running under X11.

Project files I created on Eagle PC, also imported just fine into Eagle for OSX.

I have the commercial license so I have a bigger working area, but I did learned and designed everything initially on the free version.

What exactly is the definition of a "layer"? Is it copper layers, or does that include everything like soldermask, silkscreen, etc.?

[quote author="bobschwenkler"]What exactly is the definition of a "layer"? Is it copper layers, or does that include everything like soldermask, silkscreen, etc.?[/quote]

It's everything.

-a

So when production places say that they'll make a two layer board though, that generally means two copper layers, right?

[quote author="bobschwenkler"]So when production places say that they'll make a two layer board though, that generally means two copper layers, right?[/quote]

Yes, the shorthand is when the board house says "layers" they mean copper layers.

Most EDA software doesn't make any distinction between copper layers or silkscreen or soldermask or any other "layer" as they are all "logical." High-end stuff does know not to do things like autoroute on non-copper layers, but from the point-of-view of the software, it's all shapes on a plane

-a

[quote author="keefaz"]I use Geda in Linux
http://www.geda.seul.org/

there is a Mac OSX version through fink:
http://www.ghz.cc/charles/fink/

But honestly I haven't tried it on Mac OSX
It is free, unlimited board size, up to 16 layers by default (can add more if wanted...), circuit simulation available etc...[/quote]

I was able to build the gEDA suite under OS X 10.4 but it went to shit when I installed 10.5.

There are some dependencies that make building it quite a challenge. The most significant is guile, which depends on the gmp library, and the gmp maintainer is quite hostile to the Mac and as such that library does not compile without intervention (./configure; make fails). Apparently, other developers have submitted patches for gmp to allow it to build on OS X but these patches have been rejected.

That's the sort of rank stupidity that makes it difficult to recommend open-source software to anyone who's not a serious Unix hacker.

But back to gEDA and pcb ... there are a handful of annoyances that make it less desirable to use than alternatives. One is that when you drag a footprint, the ratsnest doesn't stay with the footprint. You have to drop the footprint and then the ratsnest is regenerated. Also, many decent PCB tools will show the netname on each pin; pcb does not do this (and the developers don't see why it's useful).

I follow the gEDA user mailing list and the suite is in active development, which is a good sign. There's a lot of discussion now about different approaches to libraries and every user has an opinion!

McCAD looks interesting but I wish they'd update the user interface ... it's so OS 9. It really needs a refresh.

-a

What about Epoxy???

[quote author="Andy Peters"]There are some dependencies that make building it quite a challenge. The most significant is guile, which depends on the gmp library, and the gmp maintainer is quite hostile to the Mac and as such that library does not compile without intervention (./configure; make fails). Apparently, other developers have submitted patches for gmp to allow it to build on OS X but these patches have been rejected.
[/quote]
I agree, I myself found problem with compiling gwave (simulation graph viewer) on my Linux box (slackware) as I don't have gnome installed and its hell of dependencies. All other gEda softwares compilation went fine though...

[quote author="Andy Peters"]
But back to gEDA and pcb ... there are a handful of annoyances that make it less desirable to use than alternatives. One is that when you drag a footprint, the ratsnest doesn't stay with the footprint. You have to drop the footprint and then the ratsnest is regenerated. Also, many decent PCB tools will show the netname on each pin; pcb does not do this (and the developers don't see why it's useful).[/quote]
I drag a footprint with the middle mouse button (on rotate tool) and the ratnest seems to follow (more or less I must admit ), also to look at netname for pins, I use the lock tool on it (wierd but it works)
At first, I was disapointed with pcb and gschem but with a little training, I found them usefull. Also they use plain text files as file format which is an advantage over proprietary formats if you want to automate things or just copy and paste some part.
I am used to Linux, so really it is no annoyance to me but surelly there must be some easier alternative for Mac OS