[sdiy] PC board from artwork?

[rsdio at audiobanshee.com]

The restrictions for the free version of EAGLE have changed over the years. Be sure to visit their web site to see what the exact limitations are these days. Unfortunately, the paid versions seem to be more expensive than they used to be, at least at the feature level I previously had. I waited for the upgrade to go on sale before I could justify the added expensive of upgrading.

That said, the ergonomics of EAGLE have improved vastly! Previously, I could never seem to remember the condoned method for zooming or scrolling. I would usually use the mouse or trackpad and be confused by the result. Now, EAGLE is fully integrated with OSX interface controls. I can scroll and pinch zoom from my MacBook Pro trackpad without even thinking about it. Kudos to CADSoft for finally putting in the effort to modernize their software. The older versions obviously maintained a very old tradition of CAD software, where everything was in the inscrutable, ancient standards. The current version is very straightforward, in my opinion, at least compared to older software.

Brian


On Oct 21, 2016, at 1:16 AM, Steve <sleepy_dog at gmx.de> wrote:
> I also likde diptrace. And found RS' Designspark to be rather unwieldy "bloatware", but maybe someone with the latest and greatest PC hardware won't notice.
> A colleague complained of some missing features in diptrace - but he uses $$$$ altium, so, yeah, whatever ;)
> Btw., one can mail the diptrace people and ask for a non-commercial license key - which increases the 300 pin limitation of the downloaded for-free version to 500 pins. I like this limit better than a board size limit like EAGLE imposes (not to mention that the first two letters of EAGLE must surely stand for Ergonomical Aberration :-P )
> 
> If you have, like Tom said, a method of using suboptimal tools, but that you are used to, and are reluctant to ry something else because of the learning curve:
> I can say that I found DipTrace rather easy to learn, with hardly any prior usage of this kind of software.