Best PCB design tool?

[rock soderstrom]

I'm ducking to avoid any tomatoes that will be thrown at me but I've had a lot of success with EasyEDA. the UI is pretty clunky until you start working with schemos and PCBs and then it's fine. Because it's all web-based, I don't have to worry much about being at a computer with a local installation, and the export directly to JLC is pretty straightforward. I have built libraries in it as well.

+1

I also use EasyEDA. A very easy to learn software with high performance and many functions. It also has good import and export pipelines and 3D visualisation.

It's free, ideal for the DIYer

 

[jasonallenh]

+1

I also use EasyEDA. A very easy to learn software with high performance and many functions. It also has good import and export pipelines and 3D visualisation.

It's free, ideal for the DIYer

Ideal* until the Internet cuts out

 

[rock soderstrom]

Ideal* until the Internet cuts out

I don't use it but EasyEDA also offers an (kind of) offline function in the standard version. The pro Version is AFAIK full offline functional.

 

[mihi_fuchs]

If you wanna be really, really, really lazy you can even go and request footprints for part from components search engine.
https://componentsearchengine.com/
i did several times and footprints were ok. however 1 or 2 parts they rejected, cuz they were too special …
Waiting time was roughly a couple of days to two weeks. you just send the link to the datasheet. and you have to be registered there, which was for free when i did. don‘t know about now.

However, building your own footprints is much faster, and you can modify and adept them to your needs.

+1 for Kicad from my side in context of software. but many of the others i simply never tried …

 

[SwedishWings]

Feel free to laugh! I have been using the "stone age" TANGO (DOS) program for more than 30 years. Ever since 286 computers. Of course, today on a Dell inspiron I 7 notebook with Win 10 operational system and Dosbox utility. I like it because I can easily create a library for any part and I can also draw it manually. Especially for sound engineering circuits, where you have to solve everything in your head and by hand anyway, if you really want something good! (Although you can already do this based on the schematic, it is difficult.)

I've done a lot of designs in Tango DOS as well and really liked it, but everything was easier back then. I cracked the copy protection with Turbo Debugger to get rid of that horrible dongle. Am I going to jail now?

 

[rock soderstrom]

Am I going to jail now?

I don't know what it's like in Manila, but here in Germany it's considered time-barred!
You can continue to ease your soul and confess your software sins to us ...

 

[MidnightArrakis]

I cracked the (DOS) copy protection. Am I going to jail now?

[I cracked the copy protection] -- AAHHHH!!! "The Good Ol' Days"!!! ..... Back when I was first venturing into the world of -- CAD -- PCB design during the late-1980's, I had met another PCB Designer guy at a job with a defense contractor and we became friends. However, this other guy was also teaching himself with how to debug and write code and he was able to figure out how to bypass the dongle for the DOS-based PCB-design software that the defense contractor used. At the time, that PCB-design program had cost $15,000!!!

So, he figured out how to create a "cracked" copy of the software and sold me a copy for $50. You know.....for "development" time. This then allowed me to install the $15,000 program onto my 10-MHz '286' computer at home and I would basically spend all of my waking hours at home learning all of the -- ins and outs -- of how the software worked. Of course, my doing all of this was at the chagrin of my girlfriend at the time!!! But, "Technology Rules"!!!

I eventually became a "guru" on how to use this PCB-design program and before long I had started working-from-home designing PCB's for medical electronics firms, small military-related companies, industrial controls companies and others. I gotta tell ya.....working-from-home sure beats having to sit-in-traffic commuting to some job somewhere. It really cracked me up inside when I would be working on some board design project for a military-related company, with my knowing that I was using "bootleg" software!!! There just seemed to be such an "irony" to the situation!!!

Sadly.....when that PCB-design program made the transition over to WINDOWS, it ended up sucking big time and I decided to stop using it. Meanwhile, while I was employed by one of these military-related companies that used this particular program, their engineers were becoming frustrated because they were wanting more highly advanced features within their board designs and the software wasn't capable of providing what they wanted. So, the engineering management tasked me with finding a better PCB-design platform tool for the company.

Luckily, and because of all of the different types of magazines that I had subscribed to, I came across this new (at the time) PCB-design program that nobody had ever heard of before from a small company out of Massachusetts!!! A bunch of engineers and software nerds from M.I.T. got together and formed a new company to develop an advanced PCB-design program capable of doing things unheard of at the time. As I read about the features of this program, I saw it as being rather amazing and called the company up and explained to them what it was that my employer was looking for.

They replied....."NO PROBLEM"!!!.....and they sent me a fully-functional program with a limited-time license. At the time, it worked on the WINDOWS 3.1 OS in 1993.

I installed the software and I found it to be totally amazing!!! How the program was structured "just made sense" to me with its menus and all of its features with component placement and routing was "thrilling" to use. From my personal perspective, it was the first time I had experienced the feeling of designing PCB's as actually being "FUN"!!!

Two years later, in 1995, after the PCB-design program by one of the major players in the PCB-design software industry tanked because it was so bad, the "major player" company purchased the Massachusetts company and its PCB-design program and over a few years' time, "folded" the Massachusetts PCB-design program into their own schematic-design program and now it is one of the major top-tier PCB-design programs within the electronics industry. I have made mention of my owning this software in other previous posts.

What all of this rambling eventually leads me up to is.....somewhere around the year 2000, I came across some guy I think on eBay, who was selling a "cracked" copy of this PCB-design program for $100. Of course, I thought, "WHAT A DEAL"!!! GOTTA HAVE IT!!!

This guy lived in Malaysia, so I sent him $100 by using a "wire-transfer" and in less than 2-weeks later, I received a CD that had the complete program on it delivered to me by DHL. I also figured that $100 in Malaysia was probably the equivalent to "robbing a bank" here in the U.S., so he was probably totally thrilled!!! In any case, I followed his detailed installation instructions and the program launched and worked perfectly!!! YA-A-A-A-YYY!!!

So.....just like my DOS PCB-design program from the 1980's, I spent hours going through and using the software in order to learn everything about it. And, again.....I became a "guru" on its use. How do I know this??? Because not only was I sitting here-at-home designing complex PCB's for aerospace/avionics companies and defense contractors, but also because one day when my telephone rings and I answer it by saying, "Hello"???...............the person on the other end of the phone-line replies by saying, "My name is Mr. So-And-So and I am with the N - S - A.....the National Security Agency. We just recently conducted our own online search for a specific individual using a set of strict search terms and our final search results showed your name at being at the top of the list!!! Do you have a moment to speak with me"??? >>> And, I'm thinking....."OH!!! MY GOD!!! -- THEY'VE DISCOVERED THAT I'VE BEEN USING 'BOOTLEG' SOFTWARE TO DESIGN DEFENSE CONTRACTOR PCB'S"!!! OH!!! NO-O-O-O-O!!! I'M GOING TO JAIL!!!

So.....the NSA guy proceeds to tell me that their search results tell them that I am a "guru" with knowing how to use this particular PCB-design program and if I would be willing to drive to their engineering facility there at Ft. Meade, MD to help them out. What the NSA wants me to do is to teach a team of 8 engineers with how to use the program better and understand all of its feature intricacies. (And, I'm thinking....."WHEW"!!! THEY DON'T KNOW"!!!).

I agree and show-up the following Monday. And.....because I am a "non-cleared, unsecured and non-vetted" civilian going into probably one of the most-secure buildings on planet Earth!!!.....as I enter into the NSA's engineering building, I am greeted by not only two armed MP's who station themselves both in front of and behind me, but then also 4 fully-armed U.S. soldiers with loaded M16 rifles, who position themselves on either side of the MP's!!! I KID YOU NOT!!! And, I'm thinking....."THIS all could be a scene out of some unbelievable drama-thriller movie and.....I'M IN IT"!!!

Later.....the MP who is stationed in front of me barks an order out and the 7 of us proceed to march (yeah....."march", not walk) through the halls of this NSA building until we get to a large conference room, where the engineers are sitting at desks with computers on them. The lead MP barks an order for us to "HALT!!!" and then the two MP's leave and the four U.S. soldiers with M16 rifles and I enter into the conference room. Once inside the conference room, each of the four soldiers station themselves into each of the four corners of the room and stand at "ATTENTION". You know....."just in case" I go berserk for some reason!!!

Meanwhile, I go up to the front of the room and introduce myself. What you need to know about all of this is.....I have never done this before and I certainly didn't have any training course material to go by. I just totally "winged-it" all from memory because I knew the software so well. However, it was still "scary".

So.....this goes on for 3-days and at the end of the third day as I am leaving the building, the security guard loudly yells out my name and asks me to step over to his desk. I comply, thinking that I'm going to get frisked-down, to see if I had made-off with anything. As I approach the guard and his desk, he gets up and extends his right-hand out to shake my hand. As we shake hands, he says to me, "THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE!!!" and as he says that, with his left-hand he hands me a blank envelope and then says, "GOOD DAY"!!!

I leave the building and get back into my car. After buckling up my seatbelt, I open the envelope and discover that it is filled with the absolute most-crispest 1,000-dollar bills that you could ever imagine!!! These 1,000-dollar bills were so crisp that they were almost like really thin cardboard. They must have been printed just that morning, I thought!!! I had also figured out.....OF COURSE.....The NSA would pay me in cash!!! ..... >> I WAS NEVER THERE!!! <<

>> SO.....THAT'S MY STORY AND I'M STICKING TO IT!!! <<

[Am I going to jail now? ] -- Somehow.....I have managed to avoid having that happen to me!!!

/

 

[SwedishWings]

[I cracked the copy protection] -- AAHHHH!!! "The Good Ol' Days"!!! ..... Back when I was first venturing into the world of -- CAD -- PCB design during the late-1980's, I had met another PCB Designer guy at a job with a defense contractor and we became friends. However, this other guy was also teaching himself with how to debug and write code and he was able to figure out how to bypass the dongle for the DOS-based PCB-design software that the defense contractor used. At the time, that PCB-design program had cost $15,000!!!

So, he figured out how to create a "cracked" copy of the software and sold me a copy for $50. You know.....for "development" time. This then allowed me to install the $15,000 program onto my 10-MHz '286' computer at home and I would basically spend all of my waking hours at home learning all of the -- ins and outs -- of how the software worked. Of course, my doing all of this was at the chagrin of my girlfriend at the time!!! But, "Technology Rules"!!!

I eventually became a "guru" on how to use this PCB-design program and before long I had started working-from-home designing PCB's for medical electronics firms, small military-related companies, industrial controls companies and others. I gotta tell ya.....working-from-home sure beats having to sit-in-traffic commuting to some job somewhere. It really cracked me up inside when I would be working on some board design project for a military-related company, with my knowing that I was using "bootleg" software!!! There just seemed to be such an "irony" to the situation!!!

Sadly.....when that PCB-design program made the transition over to WINDOWS, it ended up sucking big time and I decided to stop using it. Meanwhile, while I was employed by one of these military-related companies that used this particular program, their engineers were becoming frustrated because they were wanting more highly advanced features within their board designs and the software wasn't capable of providing what they wanted. So, the engineering management tasked me with finding a better PCB-design platform tool for the company.

Luckily, and because of all of the different types of magazines that I had subscribed to, I came across this new (at the time) PCB-design program that nobody had ever heard of before from a small company out of Massachusetts!!! A bunch of engineers and software nerds from M.I.T. got together and formed a new company to develop an advanced PCB-design program capable of doing things unheard of at the time. As I read about the features of this program, I saw it as being rather amazing and called the company up and explained to them what it was that my employer was looking for.

They replied....."NO PROBLEM"!!!.....and they sent me a fully-functional program with a limited-time license. At the time, it worked on the WINDOWS 3.1 OS in 1993.

I installed the software and I found it to be totally amazing!!! How the program was structured "just made sense" to me with its menus and all of its features with component placement and routing was "thrilling" to use. From my personal perspective, it was the first time I had experienced the feeling of designing PCB's as actually being "FUN"!!!

Two years later, in 1995, after the PCB-design program by one of the major players in the PCB-design software industry tanked because it was so bad, the "major player" company purchased the Massachusetts company and its PCB-design program and over a few years' time, "folded" the Massachusetts PCB-design program into their own schematic-design program and now it is one of the major top-tier PCB-design programs within the electronics industry. I have made mention of my owning this software in other previous posts.

What all of this rambling eventually leads me up to is.....somewhere around the year 2000, I came across some guy I think on eBay, who was selling a "cracked" copy of this PCB-design program for $100. Of course, I thought, "WHAT A DEAL"!!! GOTTA HAVE IT!!!

This guy lived in Malaysia, so I sent him $100 by using a "wire-transfer" and in less than 2-weeks later, I received a CD that had the complete program on it delivered to me by DHL. I also figured that $100 in Malaysia was probably the equivalent to "robbing a bank" here in the U.S., so he was probably totally thrilled!!! In any case, I followed his detailed installation instructions and the program launched and worked perfectly!!! YA-A-A-A-YYY!!!

So.....just like my DOS PCB-design program from the 1980's, I spent hours going through and using the software in order to learn everything about it. And, again.....I became a "guru" on its use. How do I know this??? Because not only was I sitting here-at-home designing complex PCB's for aerospace/avionics companies and defense contractors, but also because one day when my telephone rings and I answer it by saying, "Hello"???...............the person on the other end of the phone-line replies by saying, "My name is Mr. So-And-So and I am with the N - S - A.....the National Security Agency. We just recently conducted our own online search for a specific individual using a set of strict search terms and our final search results showed your name at being at the top of the list!!! Do you have a moment to speak with me"??? >>> And, I'm thinking....."OH!!! MY GOD!!! -- THEY'VE DISCOVERED THAT I'VE BEEN USING 'BOOTLEG' SOFTWARE TO DESIGN DEFENSE CONTRACTOR PCB'S"!!! OH!!! NO-O-O-O-O!!! I'M GOING TO JAIL!!!

So.....the NSA guy proceeds to tell me that their search results tell them that I am a "guru" with knowing how to use this particular PCB-design program and if I would be willing to drive to their engineering facility there at Ft. Meade, MD to help them out. What the NSA wants me to do is to teach a team of 8 engineers with how to use the program better and understand all of its feature intricacies. (And, I'm thinking....."WHEW"!!! THEY DON'T KNOW"!!!).

I agree and show-up the following Monday. And.....because I am a "non-cleared, unsecured and non-vetted" civilian going into probably one of the most-secure buildings on planet Earth!!!.....as I enter into the NSA's engineering building, I am greeted by not only two armed MP's who station themselves both in front of and behind me, but then also 4 fully-armed U.S. soldiers with loaded M16 rifles, who position themselves on either side of the MP's!!! I KID YOU NOT!!! And, I'm thinking....."THIS all could be a scene out of some unbelievable drama-thriller movie"!!!

Later.....the MP who is stationed in front of me barks an order out and the 7 of us proceed to march (yeah....."march", not walk) through the halls of this NSA building until we get to a large conference room, where the engineers are sitting at desks with computers on them. The lead MP barks an order for us to "HALT!!!" and then the two MP's leave and the four U.S. soldiers with M16 rifles and I enter into the conference room. Once inside the conference room, each of the four soldiers station themselves into each of the four corners of the room and stand at "ATTENTION". You know....."just in case" I go berserk for some reason!!!

Meanwhile, I go up to the front of the room and introduce myself. What you need to know about all of this is.....I have never done this before and I certainly didn't have any training course material to go by. I just totally "winged-it" all from memory because I knew the software so well. However, it was still "scary".

So.....this goes on for 3-days and at the end of the third day as I am leaving the building, the security guard loudly yells out my name and asks me to step over to his desk. I comply, thinking that I'm going to get frisked-down, to see if I had made-off with anything. As I approach the guard and his desk, he gets up and extends his right-hand out to shake my hand. As we shake hands, he says to me, "THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE!!!" and as he says that, with his left-hand he hands me a blank envelope and then says, "GOOD DAY"!!!

I leave the building and get back into my car. After buckling up my seatbelt, I open the envelope and discover that it is filled with the absolute most-crispest 1,000-dollar bills that you could ever imagine!!! These 1,000-dollar bills were so crisp that they were almost like really thin cardboard. They must have been printed just that morning, I thought!!! I had also figured.....OF COURSE.....I would be paid in cash!!! >> I WAS NEVER THERE!!! <<

>> SO.....THAT'S MY STORY AND I'M STICKING TO IT!!! <<

[Am I going to jail now? ] -- Somehow.....I have managed to avoid having that happen to me!!!

/

Gosh, what a thrilling story, thanks for sharing!

 

[MidnightArrakis]

Gosh, what a thrilling story, thanks for sharing!

[what a thrilling story, thanks for sharing!] -- You're welcome!!! I'm really glad that you enjoyed it!!! But.....you really "HAD TO BE THERE" in order to fully appreciate everything.

/

 

[gyraf]

Good story, thanks!

 

[AudioFurga]

Feel free to laugh! I have been using the "stone age" TANGO (DOS) program for more than 30 years. Ever since 286 computers. Of course, today on a Dell inspiron I 7 notebook with Win 10 operational system and Dosbox utility. I like it because I can easily create a library for any part and I can also draw it manually. Especially for sound engineering circuits, where you have to solve everything in your head and by hand anyway, if you really want something good! (Although you can already do this based on the schematic, it is difficult.)

Hello, I have also used TANGO (DOS) for more than 30 years, a few days ago the PC I used for this died, I am not a computer expert and I am having a hard time installing TANGO on DOSBOX. Could you share knowledge about it? Thank you

 

[MidnightArrakis]

Hello, I have also used TANGO (DOS) for more than 30 years, a few days ago the PC I used for this died, I am not a computer expert and I am having a hard time installing TANGO on DOSBOX. Could you share knowledge about it? Thank you

[the PC I used for this died] -- Just buy yourself some old PC that will accommodate the same type of hard-drive that your dead PC had and.....assuming that the hard-drive didn't crash.....just swap-out your TANGO hard-drive into your "new" old computer and "keep on, keeping on"!!! That's what I did when my old computer died due to a motherboard failure and I just took out the old hard-drives and installed them into a similar "new" old computer. Didn't miss a beat!!!

/

 

[kingkorg]

Amazing story, however somehow this part blew my mind the most. North Korea kind of stuff. Snowden is on permanent vacation in Russia because of your cracked software

We just recently conducted our own online search for a specific individual using a set of strict search terms and our final search results showed your name at being at the top of the list!!!

 

[MidnightArrakis]

Amazing story, however somehow this part blew my mind the most. North Korea kind of stuff. Snowden is on permanent vacation in Russia because of your cracked software

[We just recently conducted our own online search for a specific individual using a set of strict search terms and our final search results showed your name at being at the top of the list!!!] -- Trust me!!! Learning about this was rather troubling for me to handle!!! I sat here-at-home thinking about how an algorithm setup with a set of specific parameters could eek-out and/or pin-point one specific individual out of the hundreds-of-millions of people here in the U.S. is an actual reality and is truly scary!!! However, at least for me at-the-time, being surrounded by U.S. soldiers with loaded M16 rifles while being escorted and marched around the halls of a building here in the U.S. was more frightening and scary than my being searched out by a software program.

I have no idea of how or why Snowden is in Russian because of my using "cracked" software, though. Fill me in, OK???

/

 

[kingkorg]

I have no idea of how or why Snowden is in Russian because of my using "cracked" software, though. Fill me in, OK???

That was an attempt of a joke. Snowden is in Russia because he revealed NSA spied on US citizens. However poor NSA was just looking for PCB designers. Another joke attempt

 

[SwedishWings]

That was an attempt of a joke. Snowden is in Russia because he revealed NSA spied on US citizens. However poor NSA was just looking for PCB designers. Another joke attempt

NSA; the only gov. agency that actually listen to you.

 

[McIrish]

I've owned a copy of Eagle for a few decades. It's been a couple years since I did any major designs but it always worked great for me. Too bad they got swallowed up by the big fish.

 

[Khron]

I've owned a copy of Eagle for a few decades. It's been a couple years since I did any major designs but it always worked great for me. Too bad they got swallowed up by the big fish.

Same here, still on 6.5.0; only good thing about that last part is that my new workplace uses Fusion 360, so the transition "trauma" was minimal

 

[chrispbass]

I’ve recently started using EasyEDA and have found it very intuitive to use.
Seems to have a very good library of components and many user generated ones, which also include many of the staple items used on here.

 

[Disco Volante]

What if there was a way to share libraries between us, instead of everybody building their own? I know some individual adjustment is necessary since we don't all build the same things, but still..
Like a "hifiengine" sort of thing just with components, footprints, etc. Or maybe a PCB section alongside the "tech docs" section?