[sdiy] PCB Layout Software?

[Tom Wiltshire]

On 13 Aug 2013, at 12:22, Neil Johnson <neil.johnson71 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> Donald Tillman wrote:
>>>> User's needs are going to be wildly diverse, so in practice I think most people will end up building their own libraries anyway, or at least heavily modifying existing symbols and footprints, and so a universal standard library may not be the best goal.
> 
> Tom Wiltshire wrote:
>>> Don makes a good point, 'though I don't agree totally. I made myself a library of "SDIY" parts that you don't find often - CA3080, SSM2164, suff like that. But having standard libraries for parts like 74HC series, voltage regulators, and that kind of thing definitely saves time. I wouldn't expect to have to make my own library for every transistor I put in a board, and I'd expect a decent PCB design package to include a good selection of standard parts in a usable form.
> 
> cheater00 wrote:
>> In addition to that, it's simply not possible to model the parts
>> correctly yourself for 3D renders and spatial compliance testing.
> 
> Having been caught out by errors in CAD vendors libraries I now create
> my own from scratch.  You do carefully check the vendor libs against
> the datasheet and the physical part don't you (in case of errors in
> the datasheet)?
> 
> And I'm not talking at the cheap end either.

I've also been caught out by an error in a standard libraries. It was a 74HC138 iirc. Since then, I have checked all the parts I use, and if it's something I haven't used before, I do have a quick check over the data sheet, just to make sure things match up. I've never found another error, but that one cost me a brand-new PCB that went straight in the bin.

Regards,
Tom