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I've looked thru the forum for free, and most important, easy PCB software that outputs Gerber files. The 2 that seem to crop up are XICAD and Design Spark.
Any one have experience with both and if so could you point me in the right direction?
There is no easy. You will not be an expert in an hour. or a day or a week.easy PCB software
There is no easy. You will not be an expert in an hour. or a day or a week.
On forums there is a general feeling that 'what I use is easy and what you use is hard'. It is only easy because you use it.
I have used Express PCB. I found it very easy to learn. Then I tried Eagle and quit after about 3 hours. Maybe the better they are the harder they are to learn.
The thing I'm after is the Gerber files as Express PCB only works with them which is kind of ok if all you ever build is one or 3.
Think I'll give Design Spark a go. I guess it's just disk space.
once you get past the initial GUI hatred hurdle
HiHi eTech,
Some people don't / can't get past the GUI "quirks", and you are quite right, you shouldn't pay for something you don't like as you will end up not using it, which is why it is good that they offer a free / trial version of these various software packages, I think Altium is the only one that doesn't.
Out of interest, which package did you settle on in the end?
Funny, that was my problem with design spark. I tried to make a FET. Watched a couple of videos and read a help file along the way. Maybe 3 hours. Finally got both the schematic symbol and the board symbol together, but when I called them back to place them in the schematic it didn't like it. Tried the same with eagle and made it in about 30 minutes. Now when your my age this is very important. To be honest I would still be using express PCB except this is for someone else and Gerber files are needed. It's my understanding Eagle outputs Gerber? I don't know why Express was easy for me. It has a very small library so you have to make a lot of stuff, but it was just easy for me.
ian says:
April 8, 2014 at 7:36 am
Holy ****. I’m ian, I did this. This was an inside joke and a weekend hackathon, never meant to be public. We will ship orders but it really is a joke. I mean… you like it dirty and you’re back for more… where are my damn pcbs? I thought it was obvious lol. All the backend is there and boards are proper, we have a logistics company, but its really just a joke that went too far. It started cause we saw people bitching about cheap pcbs having bad silks and I’m like, well its dirt cheap dirty boards… thanks for the post though, were sitting in Shenzhen with a dozen hackers eating hot pot loling about this