Altium Libraries

[bostonman]

I have an older copy of Altium (2014 I think) and have only some basic components.

Is there a way to obtain full libraries of various components without being a registered user? At the moment I'm looking for a 44 pin PLCC, but I'm sure they'll be many more I'll need.

[mkissin]

Creating your own is pretty easy, and you'll want to carefully verify any you download anyway.
Having said that, the Celestial Altium Library is great - https://altiumlibrary.com/

[mengfei]

just like the above mention once you have the complete spec sheets library is done in less than 10 minutes with those simple footprints but not with those QFN's where in you need to calculate of distance & have irregular pad size & distance 

or you could also use PCBlibraries Footprint Expert

[ftg]

Doesn't your license come with the built in footprint wizard?
The IPC compliant wizard and the non-IPC one should have PLCC in it.
Then it's just a question of verifying it against the datasheet of your part.
If Altium 14 does not generate the .step 3d model for the PLCC case, you might be able to find something suitable on grabcad or 3dcontentcentral.

[tooki]

I use SnapEDA (I think it was just renamed to snap magic or something similarly ridiculous) and UltraLibrarian to get footprints, as well as the Manufacturer Part Search within Altium (you can download the footprint locally).

If I have to create a footprint, or a downloaded one that has a poor 3D model, I will download it from the IC manufacturer (they almost always have a 3D model), and otherwise, KiCad comes with a fantastic library of 3D models. I use those a lot.

[bostonman]

My PCB design experience is with (no laughing) PCAD 2006. Years back my old company was upgrading and gave me a full licensed copy. With the exception of periodic glancing over the shoulders of the PCB group whenever I roamed over to the department, I didn't know anything about laying out a PCB.

Once I tinkered with PCAD, I was able to design the schematic symbol, PCB footprint, schematic, and PCB. Ignoring I don't know all the design rules, I successfully made a few PCBs (although I haven't made a PCB in about ten-years).

I've tinkered with Altium here and there, but technically I don't have any experience. Since I've seen most companies I work at use Altium, I've had an interest in trying to understand it better. From what I can tell, the steps are similar to PCAD, except much cooler since it will generate a 3D model of the PCB.

The PLCC socket has a .step file on DigiKey, and I placed it FreeCAD just for fun to view it (I think 3D models are cool), but not certain whether a .step file contains necessary information for pad spacing and stuff associated with making a PCB. I thought the .step file I had was mainly for 3D modeling/printing.

I have a small Altium library collection, don't remember where I got it from. Maybe at some point I was able to access a library at my old job, so I copied several items from the Altium server, but I'm uncertain. I vaguely remember accessing an Altium library and saying: let me get as many as I can so I have them in the future.

In any case, it seems I have basic transistors and stuff, and, for some reason, a boat load of FPGA libraries.

As mentioned above, the steps I know is: create schematic symbol and footprint (followed by creating a schematic, transferring the net list, and then making a PCB). Those are the only two steps I believe for making a component that will be used for all other PCB design steps.

Does the .step file provide all that information and I already have it because I downloaded the PLCC socket .step file?

[tooki]

A step file is a 3D model, nothing more. It doesn’t contain anything regarding the footprint. (Step is a super-common format for 3D models in general; it is not specifically for electronics.)

[bostonman]

Oh okay, that was my assumption.

What is needed for an Altium footprint library file then?

As mentioned, I’m aware of creating them from scratch, and maybe it’s easy, but know a plethora of libraries exist now - some directly from the manufacture.

[tszaboo]

A step file is a 3D model, nothing more. It doesn’t contain anything regarding the footprint. (Step is a super-common format for 3D models in general; it is not specifically for electronics.)

But having the right step files, with leads can save you from bone-headed mistakes.
Not that I would be speaking from experience, I never had an incorrect footprint. 

[tooki]

A step file is a 3D model, nothing more. It doesn’t contain anything regarding the footprint. (Step is a super-common format for 3D models in general; it is not specifically for electronics.)

But having the right step files, with leads can save you from bone-headed mistakes.
Not that I would be speaking from experience, I never had an incorrect footprint. 

I 100% agree with this, and that is precisely why I now fastidiously add STEP files whenever possible! (That, and because the 3D view of a fully-populated board with all the components modeled makes it much easier to notice if, for example, you’ve got tall components so close to each order that you won’t be able to fit the soldering iron in between them to solder them in.)

[tooki]

What is needed for an Altium footprint library file then?

As mentioned, I’m aware of creating them from scratch, and maybe it’s easy, but know a plethora of libraries exist now - some directly from the manufacture.

To insert a component into your schematic and PCB, you need the schematic symbol (aka “component”, which lives in a .schlib file) and one or more PCB footprints, which live in a .pcblib file. They can be distributed as a combined .intlib file. You can have as many library files as you want, and each can contain as many schematic symbols and/or footprints as you want. The schematic symbol points to one or more PCB footprints; without this link nothing happens. The PCB footprints, on the other hand, are blithely unaware of schematic symbols.

But I’m not sure what you’re truly asking at this point.

[bostonman]

But I’m not sure what you’re truly asking at this point.

I guess my question/interest goes back to my initial post. It seems in order to easily obtain libraries (schematic symbol and footprint) is to be a paid/paying Altium member or try to find manufactures who provide them with their components; ignoring being able to create the components in Altium.

At the moment I only have some basic component libraries I believe limiting me from creating the most basic PCBs, so I was curious if anyone has libraries they can send that would allow me to create PCBs containing various size through-hole and SMT symbols and footprints? Also, for the more elaborate components, where can I find such libraries online (again, ignoring that I can build them in Altium)?

Since my assumption is/was that these libraries contain the schematic symbol, PCB footprint, and the 3D model (.step file), then having a plethora of libraries would allow me to create basic PCBs.

[T3sl4co1l]

You're looking for these: https://techdocs.altium.com/display/ADOH/Download%2BLibraries

Offhand, the Altera MAX 5000 library has a PLCC-44.  Looks reasonable enough, of course you may want to adapt the mechanical layers and any drawing nomenclature to your house style, and replacing the nondescript cuboid with a realistic model like https://www.3dcontentcentral.com/secure/download-model.aspx?catalogid=171&id=815199 might not be a bad idea.

You should also have access to whatever Vault content you license purchased; you may be able to find a SCH symbol for the part in question, too.  Should be some as of AD14, but if it was older than that, or, uh, whenever it was they launched Vault, I forget, you might be out of luck.  I haven't used it in a long while, myself... but I have used it to grab a few larger parts over the years, to my convenience.

Tim

[tooki]

But I’m not sure what you’re truly asking at this point.

I guess my question/interest goes back to my initial post. It seems in order to easily obtain libraries (schematic symbol and footprint) is to be a paid/paying Altium member or try to find manufactures who provide them with their components; ignoring being able to create the components in Altium.

At the moment I only have some basic component libraries I believe limiting me from creating the most basic PCBs, so I was curious if anyone has libraries they can send that would allow me to create PCBs containing various size through-hole and SMT symbols and footprints? Also, for the more elaborate components, where can I find such libraries online (again, ignoring that I can build them in Altium)?

Since my assumption is/was that these libraries contain the schematic symbol, PCB footprint, and the 3D model (.step file), then having a plethora of libraries would allow me to create basic PCBs.

I think you’re unnecessarily fixated on having a massive library of parts pre-downloaded onto your disk. There’s no need for that. I (and others) have given you several sources for where to download parts as needed.

You will often find that you need to tweak a part anyway (like editing the schematic symbol to make it “flow” better in the schematic, or modifying a footprint to make it meet your manufacturing needs*).

It’s totally up to you how to manage parts: do you make a central library with your most common parts? (In which case you need to give others that library when sharing a project with them.) Do you add newly-used parts to that central repository? Or do you create a library for each project, into which you copy only the parts used? Or do you have one library per part, kept in the project? Or any combination of the above? (I generally make a per-project library into which I copy all the parts, so that the project folder is completely independent.)


*I have found it necessary to modify TONS of PCB footprints from Altium, SnapEDA, and UltraLibrarian because they stupidly have the paste stencil aperture sizes manually overridden, meaning that whatever applicable rules I set in the project get ignored. Same with solder mask expansion sometimes.

[bostonman]

I think you’re unnecessarily fixated on having a massive library of parts pre-downloaded onto your disk. There’s no need for that. I (and others) have given you several sources for where to download parts as needed.

You're probably correct. The previous part sources suggested I thought were .step files and the main (very useful one) was the techdocs Altium library in the previous post. Maybe I overlooked more links by accident (I'll look again).

you will often find that you need to tweak a part anyway (like editing the schematic symbol to make it “flow” better in the schematic, or modifying a footprint to make it meet your manufacturing needs*).

The more I think about it, you're correct. My experience was having a large library I inherited from my old job (when they gave PCAD 2006 to me). From there I had most of the basic parts, however, I remember seeing parts that needed tweaking. Any parts I created were a few unique parts the company didn't use.

From the input of this thread, it seems parts are easier to create than I initially thought. I was thinking in order to make the "ideal" part, I needed to also spend quite a bit of time making the 3D (i.e. .step file) design too. Also, I thought nowadays creating parts was far less common, but that's not the case.

Between the feedback, links, and knowing creating parts isn't that difficult, I should have enough to start tinkering with Altium.

[tooki]

From the input of this thread, it seems parts are easier to create than I initially thought. I was thinking in order to make the "ideal" part, I needed to also spend quite a bit of time making the 3D (i.e. .step file) design too. Also, I thought nowadays creating parts was far less common, but that's not the case.

Yeah, if we had to create the 3D models from scratch I wouldn’t have 3D models, either!!

As I said, KiCad comes with a nice library of models for standard parts. The manufacturers, and many of the footprints in the Altium Vault (Manufacturer Part Search), SnapEDA, UltraLibrarian, and SamacSys, often have part-specific models with manufacturer branding and/or precise matches for both dimensions and appearance. Connectors are something where you frequently need a very specific 3D model, and any halfway decent manufacturer has them. An example of a true “model citizen” — no pun intended — in this regard is Samtec.)

The weirdest footprint I have had to create from scratch, because nobody offered it, was for an SMD balun. It had semicircular pads on the bottom, surrounded by ground, and of course it needed to connect to impedance-controlled traces. At least the manufacturer provided a 3D model, which was ideal for verifying that my interpretation of their drawing was correct!

[tooki]

P.S. On the rare occasion where I have been completely unable to obtain a 3D model for a part, I’ve used Altium’s rudimentary 3D shapes to simply make a sort of volumetric placeholder that captures the extremities. For example, a particular rotary encoder with a customized shaft length. I just made a rectangular extrusion for the base, and a cylindrical extrusion for the shaft. My design wasn’t critical in terms of the bushing, so I just left it off entirely.

[bostonman]

As I said, KiCad comes with a nice library of models for standard parts.

Maybe I'll experiment with KiCad at some point. I know it's quite popular along with Eagle (or Eagle was popular), but, similar to most pieces of software, I always try using stuff used in industry to keep myself updated for future jobs (I've haven't really been able to keep up though).  I feel the unfortunate part now is that software options have grown exponentially due to free online stuff, free software for hobbyists, high end software becoming more expensive along with harder to "obtain" (let's just say by other means), etc...

Altium being popular in industry are reasons I've been steering towards it. Although, the irony is that my current company uses Altium, however, they have one full design license for the entire engineering department (probably about 60 engineers) which is always being used (and so far every engineer I've talked to doesn't know much about using it, just how to perform basic edits). We technically don't design and outsource everything; hence why nobody knows how to use the software. For us, Altium is mainly used to view the files sent to us, and, on rare occasions, minor edits that we send to the outsourced companies for review.

To compliment your statement about the need to create your own parts, the company I obtained PCAD from had their extensive library. Unfortunately when they moved from PCAD to Pads, their libraries wouldn't convert due to them placing information on unique named layers (and also changing their layer structure over the years when they created parts). The result was having to recreate every part all over because Pads wouldn't convert the old libraries from PCAD. So I get that libraries are not always diverse and correct, and why creating your own parts is good. I also thought nowadays an industry standard existed so every Altium part/library was standard; I've learned from this thread this isn't always the case.

The steps to creating a PCB in PCAD was (I'm going by memory as I haven't done a PCB in many years): create the schematic, save the .sch (?) file (PCAD didn't have a project tree structure like Altium does), create and save a netlist from the schematic, open the PCB portion of PCAD, create the board outline, import the netlist, save the PCB file as a .PCB (?), and create the gerbers.

Obviously I'm skipping steps such as creating the component symbol, footprint, layout, traces on the PCB, component placement, etc... because those are the normal steps.

My question about Altium is regarding going from schematic to PCB: are the same steps used to go from schematic to PCB in Altium, and then create gerbers, or does Altium take a different route?

Last night I downloaded a zip file of PDF manuals from Altium, but it was quite an extensive amount of PDFs (I think 200 or something like that) in hopes of reading how to create a basic PCB, but a quick overview would be helpful to help understand the overall structure.

[T3sl4co1l]

P.S. On the rare occasion where I have been completely unable to obtain a 3D model for a part, I’ve used Altium’s rudimentary 3D shapes to simply make a sort of volumetric placeholder that captures the extremities. For example, a particular rotary encoder with a customized shaft length. I just made a rectangular extrusion for the base, and a cylindrical extrusion for the shaft. My design wasn’t critical in terms of the bushing, so I just left it off entirely.

You can get pretty in-depth, if you care to (but, you shouldn't, the primitives are very limited and there are no tools to dimension and cut them).  I've made some rather nice transformer models myself.

Tim

[ajb]

The steps to creating a PCB in PCAD was (I'm going by memory as I haven't done a PCB in many years): create the schematic, save the .sch (?) file (PCAD didn't have a project tree structure like Altium does), create and save a netlist from the schematic, open the PCB portion of PCAD, create the board outline, import the netlist, save the PCB file as a .PCB (?), and create the gerbers.

The basic workflow is a bit more streamlined in Altium, because under the hood it does a lot more automatic tracking of information between sch and pcb.  With the .schDoc and .pcbDoc files in the same project, once you create the schematic you use the Design > Update (shortcut keys: D, U) to create create a list of changes to be made to the PCB (which you can review for errors if you want), then click 'Execute', and the PCB should be updated automatically.  At that point you should definitely review the change list to ensure there were no errors.  If you make any changes in the schematic, just repeat the process.  You can also make changes in the PCB and push them back to the schematic, but this is not something you need to do very often.  There are times when things get out of sync and you may need to manually help the update process, but that's generally the process.  When it's time to create gerbers, BOM, etc, you can generate those from the menus (File > Fabrication Outputs, File > Assembly Outputs...), but outJobs are more powerful and more convenient once set up.  They allow you to generate all of your outputs in one or two clicks, with output file names driven by the project documents and/or parameters. 

(I generally make a per-project library into which I copy all the parts, so that the project folder is completely independent.)

Just to be clear for the OP: the project's sch and pcb files are already 'independent', in the sense that the symbols, footprints, parameters, etc will be present and correct when you open them, even if the project is completely separated from the library files they came from.  Having a copackaged, project-specific library would make it easier to tweak the footprints to suit the project if needed, but on the other hand means that any generalized improvements aren't automatically making it back to your central library where they can help future projects.  Just to  about how there are a million different reasons you might manage your library a million different ways.

[tooki]

(I generally make a per-project library into which I copy all the parts, so that the project folder is completely independent.)

Just to be clear for the OP: the project's sch and pcb files are already 'independent', in the sense that the symbols, footprints, parameters, etc will be present and correct when you open them, even if the project is completely separated from the library files they came from.  Having a copackaged, project-specific library would make it easier to tweak the footprints to suit the project if needed, but on the other hand means that any generalized improvements aren't automatically making it back to your central library where they can help future projects.  Just to  about how there are a million different reasons you might manage your library a million different ways.

I mean... sorta. Yes, even without the library files the PCB file will open correctly because the footprints are embedded in the pcb file, and the schematic will open correctly becayse the symbols are embedded in the sch file. But try and make a change that requires updating a footprint, and it'll complain that it can't find the  footprint. Exporting the footprint and symbol and then re-linking them with each other is a PITA. I've been much happier making sure that the project's libraries are completely independent and in the project folder.

[bostonman]

Last night I downloaded a zip file of PDF manuals from Altium, but it was quite an extensive amount of PDFs (I think 200 or something like that)

276 to be exact.

[T3sl4co1l]

I learned query language (really to say, properties and operators) in part because a predecessor had printed out the whole fuckin' thing, wrapped in sheet protectors and put in a binder.

Certainly not a length one needs to go to, but more to say the docs can be useful in whatever form.  I suppose they aren't as easy to find on the website, as you need to select version or date, sift through category, find the wrong topics, keep searching, check related terms or functions... and eventually/hopefully find the thing.

Tim

[PlainName]

(I generally make a per-project library into which I copy all the parts, so that the project folder is completely independent.)

Just to be clear for the OP: the project's sch and pcb files are already 'independent', in the sense that the symbols, footprints, parameters, etc will be present and correct when you open them, even if the project is completely separated from the library files they came from.  Having a copackaged, project-specific library would make it easier to tweak the footprints to suit the project if needed, but on the other hand means that any generalized improvements aren't automatically making it back to your central library where they can help future projects.  Just to  about how there are a million different reasons you might manage your library a million different ways.

I mean... sorta. Yes, even without the library files the PCB file will open correctly because the footprints are embedded in the pcb file, and the schematic will open correctly becayse the symbols are embedded in the sch file. But try and make a change that requires updating a footprint, and it'll complain that it can't find the  footprint. Exporting the footprint and symbol and then re-linking them with each other is a PITA. I've been much happier making sure that the project's libraries are completely independent and in the project folder.

There is no need for all that doubt and planning. Just go to Design|Make Integrated Library and there is your project specific library with only the components used in that project, completely editable and shareable as any other library is. (There is also Design|Make PCB Library if you just want footprints.)

So have a global library which can take updates and propagate them to any project that uses them, but also easily have a per-project library to hand out to third parties (or archive or whatever).

[tooki]

I’m fully aware of the Make Integrated Library command and use it. But it does not reassociate the symbols and footprints in the schematic and PCB with the library it outputs. So if you want to make changes, you still have to point the symbol to this library first.