If anyone wants to learn to use PADS, sign up here. You can participate or just watch and read but you will get a lot more out of it if you have at least a PADS demo copy. You can download one from Mentor Graphics at
https://www.mentor.com/products/pcb-system-design/design-flows/pads/pads-evaluation or you can send me your e-mail address by private message and I’ll tell you where you can get a demo copy.
I have been using PADS since 1987. I suffered through many revisions and had to find many work-arounds to get my designs through the process. Finally, it’s reached a level of stability that I enjoy without too much complaint. As a result of my experience, I am confident that I can use this forum to teach the basics of PADS even though the forum was not intended for such a purpose. A lot of the effort has to come from the student; you have to explore the menus and try things on your own. I can share my set-ups and my libraries and walk through a design. This will give you a quick start in finding your way around the IDE and various utilities.
For the last couple of weeks I have been considering the purchase of MikroElektronika multimedia for PIC32MX7 board and the associated microC PRO for PIC32 compiler along with the microProg for PIC32 and ancillary equipment. I believe this would be a great platform to get familiar with the PIC processor which I had never used before. There are plenty of peripherals on the board that could be used for some cool projects and if I stumble onto the right configuration, I might continue on to building a custom PCB based on these components.
To get started, I want to convert the MikroElektronika (ME) schematic into PADS logic. The ME schematic is fairly easy to understand but it could be made better. By having the design in PADS, I can then extract a Bill of Materials (BOM) and get a design netlist to feed into PADS Layout.
I won’t get started until I get an indication of some interest. So, please let me know.