EEVblog #527 - Altium Entry Level PCB Tool Rant

[baljemmett]

OK, I am very excited about this Altium free software version... But, when will it be released? is there any place or post to know about release data or should we wait forever to get it.

Just rumors really. Some Altium sales people have reportedly said October.

I was idly wondering the same thing earlier, until I realised that free_electron's teaser thread mentions Altium 14 -- which would be next year's version, as I understood their version/release numbering, or have they dropped that scheme now?

[arkayy]

Hi all,

Long time listener, first time poster. We (my Philly based product design firm) currently uses the full version of Eagle for our board design but are seriously considering switching to Altium for access to the vault and other improvements. Does anyone have experience making the transition company wide? What was that like? Are we going to be  for a while after we switch?

Ross

[alter Ratz]

Altium is going after anyone who currently uses Eagle or some other low priced package. The want to dominate a 3 tiers of the market.

I think they'll restrict the free version even more than eagle because the short-term greed always blinds the long term strategy. I fear nothing will change for the hobbyist and I have to continue to use Eagle, which I hate *very* much.

Yes. Altium have one of the worst reputations in the industry of ignoring what their customers want, and pushing into stupid new areas that were doomed to fail. The only reason customers didn't leave in droves after the last decade is because Altium essentially didn't have a rival in the same price and feature/usability bracket.

Why should they listen to anything the users want, when they have a sh***tload full of overpaid marketing guys who can tell the users what they have to want (even if they have no experience in the field and might not even know what a PCB is). Strategic decisions are always met by some bean-counters with have no technical background at all or failed miserably as technicians, backed up by a completely incompetent marketing department.   

Sorry for my somewhat pessimistic view but does always a good job from keeping me from dissapointments.

Bernhard

[vsq]

-It's not Eagle

-3d mode

-online DRC

You just made me remember what I hate most about Eagle: no online DRC!
No realtime 3D view is also a very big limitation and annoyance.

Sorry for being a noobie, but for what do you need a 3D view for?

[Agent24]

-It's not Eagle

-3d mode

-online DRC

You just made me remember what I hate most about Eagle: no online DRC!
No realtime 3D view is also a very big limitation and annoyance.

Sorry for being a noobie, but for what do you need a 3D view for?

It's very useful to show where your components are physically. PCB layout only shows half the picture: just the pads.
With 3D view you can see if the rest of the component will fit.

For example: you might think you are smart for putting a resistor next to the pads of a connector, but when you go to assemble the board, you find the connector has a large plastic housing which overlaps the resistor.

It's possible to work all this out without a 3D view, but assuming your models are accurate, it's very very useful and makes for much quicker design. You can simply *look* at what the thing will look like, and it becomes immediately obvious if something is not going to work.

[FrankBuss]

With Eagle you can view your board in 3D, too. I'm using this for my projects:

http://www.matwei.de/doku.php?id=de:eagle3d:galerie

And another one I didn't try so far:

http://eagleup.wordpress.com

But it is not as well integrated in Eagle as the 3D functions in Altium. And in Altium you can export it in STEP format, for using in other professional 3D CAD programs, e.g. to check if the board and all connectors fit in a case, and you can import models in STEP format.

[EEVblog]

Sorry for being a noobie, but for what do you need a 3D view for?

Apart from seeing your actual components (if you have the 3D models), you can get a real view of what your bare PCB will look like. Solder mask expansion, silkscreen, plated holes etc
It's just so much better than any 2D view. It has saved me countless board re-spins.

[Agent24]

With Eagle you can view your board in 3D, too. I'm using this for my projects:

http://www.matwei.de/doku.php?id=de:eagle3d:galerie

And another one I didn't try so far:

http://eagleup.wordpress.com

But it is not as well integrated in Eagle as the 3D functions in Altium. And in Altium you can export it in STEP format, for using in other professional 3D CAD programs, e.g. to check if the board and all connectors fit in a case, and you can import models in STEP format.

Yeah, it *has* 3D - but it's not realtime view is it?

KiCad and others you just press one button and instantly you get a 3D view you can rotate, zoom etc.. with this Eagle plugin, you have to export and render and bugger about.. too much hassle.

[zoomtronic]

I used 3.14rated version of protel in nineties, i still using 3.14rated version of Altium, Why? its to expensive, and i can not spend 4 figures for something i use once in 3 month

[free_electron]

Sorry for being a noobie, but for what do you need a 3D view for?

Apart from seeing your actual components (if you have the 3D models), you can get a real view of what your bare PCB will look like. Solder mask expansion, silkscreen, plated holes etc
It's just so much better than any 2D view. It has saved me countless board re-spins.

i use the 3d view to look for loops in boards. select critical nets in schematic -> altium highlights in 3d viewer -> pull pcb in exploded view and look for loops that are in vertical stack ! very difficult to find in 2d. easy in 3d.

other things is do : export modules as step and load them in the main pcb. i am working on a huge design with 9 boards. 1 carrier and 8 plugins (mezzanine) everything has to fit mechanically. i export the daughtercards including their components in step, drop the step on the layout of the main board and position it to check nothing will touch when the thing is assembled.
i have accurate models (including height) for all parts.

[tszaboo]

Sorry for being a noobie, but for what do you need a 3D view for?

Apart from seeing your actual components (if you have the 3D models), you can get a real view of what your bare PCB will look like. Solder mask expansion, silkscreen, plated holes etc
It's just so much better than any 2D view. It has saved me countless board re-spins.

i use the 3d view to look for loops in boards. select critical nets in schematic -> altium highlights in 3d viewer -> pull pcb in exploded view and look for loops that are in vertical stack ! very difficult to find in 2d. easy in 3d.

other things is do : export modules as step and load them in the main pcb. i am working on a huge design with 9 boards. 1 carrier and 8 plugins (mezzanine) everything has to fit mechanically. i export the daughtercards including their components in step, drop the step on the layout of the main board and position it to check nothing will touch when the thing is assembled.
i have accurate models (including height) for all parts.

Recently I design a board with custom injection molded plastic parts and laser-cut metal parts. Without 3D it would be very difficult to determine if they have the required clearance. Also i almost exclusively use it to place the designators on the silkscreen, it is much more visual. And I can instant impress all "the big guys in the suits", wherever they come near my table.

[dtfi]

Agreed, it's a bit like saying you can buy 30 hacksaws for the price of a CNC mill. If all you need is a hacksaw, that's fine, otherwise it's completely useless.

Don't think it's really a fair comparison.  At the end of the day both produce a gerber file which is what tells the milling machine what to do.  Altium produces the exact same gerber file that Eagle produces.  Both are capable of printing literally the exact same board.  I have seen no evidence that Altium produces better boards.  I have seen no evidence that it is capable of producing boards that Eagle can't. 

I'm evaluating AD now and frankly just not that impressed for the price they expect.  They want $9k from me initially plus annual fees.  And these people harass me more than any company I've ever dealt with.  The sales guy calls me almost every day.  Sends me emails when he's not calling.  All I wanted to do was try their software, but they don't make the download publicly available.  In order to get the trial you gotta deal with the sales guys.  A company needing a gnat-like sales strategy like this just sets off all kinds of red flags for me. 

From what I've evaluated so far, it's features are mostly show.  If you're a PCB monkey that does nothing but PCB 8-10hrs/day, then yeah, AD is probably useful with some of the special features.  The extra features will add up to bits of time here and there which adds up to money saved and real value.  If you do board designs from time to time as part of product development, I don't find the extra features all that useful so far.  90% of my time is circuit design (with other tools) and software/firmware development.  PCB is really just to support everything else.  The board design is frankly easy compared to everything else.  It'll take me a day to design the board after we have the circuit work done, then weeks or months to test and write code for it and test some more. 

I'm not giving up on it yet, but I'm not sold either.  I have a number of initial complaints but want to work through things first to make sure it's not me being a newbie with it.

[mikeselectricstuff]

Agreed, it's a bit like saying you can buy 30 hacksaws for the price of a CNC mill. If all you need is a hacksaw, that's fine, otherwise it's completely useless.

Don't think it's really a fair comparison.  At the end of the day both produce a gerber file which is what tells the milling machine what to do.  Altium produces the exact same gerber file that Eagle produces.  Both are capable of printing literally the exact same board.  I have seen no evidence that Altium produces better boards.  I have seen no evidence that it is capable of producing boards that Eagle can't. 

[/quote]
It's not about what it can produce, it's about how much time it takes to get the required result. You _can_ make gerber files with a text editor if you were really determined..

[walshms]

It's not about what it can produce, it's about how much time it takes to get the required result. You _can_ make gerber files with a text editor if you were really determined..

That' would be a level of determination beyond anything I've ever experienced! 

[dtfi]

I've never had Eagle crash and I've never encountered any show-stopping bugs.  It's just clunky to use.  From what I've heard of Altium there are complete versions that are "to be avoided" because they are so full of bugs.  All I can say about that is "wow, just wow."

I've been evaluating AD for a couple weeks and YES, it crashes.  What can I say.  Annoying as hell, and rather inexcusable too.   

I also do not like their cloud storage crap.  Obnoxious, annoying.  Give me a simple file open/close and leave me alone.   

** Side note: In general, words cannot describe how sick I am of the word "cloud" as well, the re-marketing of what is simply a server.  "It's up in the cloud somewhere."  Oh, you mean a server?  I find the peddling of this trendy marketing gimmick especially insulting when it's directed at electrical engineers as part of a PCB design suite.  We invented servers, the internet, and all the software that makes it spin, and now you're treating us like grandma who wants to get connected to "the cloud."  Just saying.

[dtfi]

Agreed, it's a bit like saying you can buy 30 hacksaws for the price of a CNC mill. If all you need is a hacksaw, that's fine, otherwise it's completely useless.

Don't think it's really a fair comparison.  At the end of the day both produce a gerber file which is what tells the milling machine what to do.  Altium produces the exact same gerber file that Eagle produces.  Both are capable of printing literally the exact same board.  I have seen no evidence that Altium produces better boards.  I have seen no evidence that it is capable of producing boards that Eagle can't. 

It's not about what it can produce, it's about how much time it takes to get the required result. You _can_ make gerber files with a text editor if you were really determined..
[/quote]

Agreed.  I'm not finding it to be much of a time saver at this point.  The core PCB design functionality should be simple.  There are only so many ways one can draw a line from one place to another.  I see it has maybe some time saving advantage in part design.  Despite the claims of a large database I seem to still have to design nearly every major part from scratch.  And this is a bit easier than in Eagle, but marginally so. 

What specific time saving features would you point out?

[free_electron]

Agreed, it's a bit like saying you can buy 30 hacksaws for the price of a CNC mill. If all you need is a hacksaw, that's fine, otherwise it's completely useless.

It'll take me a day to design the board after we have the circuit work done, then weeks or months to test and write code for it and test some more. 

If the boards you design can be designed in 1 day , you don't need altium. Eagle will do fine.

Come back and look at altium when the boards you design become so complex it takes a week or even multiple weeks to pull the pcb layout together...
The project i am working on right now is in its 5th week of layout... and i probably have 4 more weeks to go. A large motherboard with 8 mezzanine boards. everything has to mechanically fit as this assembly ends up in a big rack totalling hundreds of these assemblies.

There is all kinds of connectors , controlled impedance , length equalised nets across boards and much more.. there is heat sink assemblies with sub boards that need to mesh with alignment holes on the board underneath. ...  good luck figuring all this crap out by hand and then drawing it in eagle. i can plonk my assembly down in 3d space , put alignment guides and the holes and connectors automatically lock into place. i know that my boards will perfectly align and match.

[Rufus]

It'll take me a day to design the board after we have the circuit work done.

Then you have never designed a board which is even vaguely complex or challenging.

A guy on the Altium forum has done a board with 24 layers, 14k5 components, 32k vias, 59k pads, 9k5 nets. The board and revisions took over a year, the hours spent on it were described as too many to count.

[EEVblog]

Yes, it's not uncommon for a large complex professional PCB to take several months of layout work. Any half decent PCB is a good weeks work.
Ask anyone who does contract PCB layout for a living.
As a former full time PCB layout guy myself, the longest board I've worked on was about 8 weeks layout work, give or take.
Hobby stuff takes a day.

[dtfi]

It'll take me a day to design the board after we have the circuit work done.

Then you have never designed a board which is even vaguely complex or challenging.

A guy on the Altium forum has done a board with 24 layers, 14k5 components, 32k vias, 59k pads, 9k5 nets. The board and revisions took over a year, the hours spent on it were described as too many to count.

Easy there tiger.  I was really just meaning to make a general comparison as to how the time gets distributed.  I didn't literally mean a day, my fault.  All I meant to convey is that as a general ratio, the PCB is the least of the concern with the work I do.  I have spent several weeks on a single PCB version before.  Most of the PCBs I deal with are 6-8 layers, but I have worked on as high as 14 before.  But after the initial board design assuming testing goes well, I generally won't need to touch the PCB design again for a long time. I could go months.  Maybe a tiny iteration here and there, but nothing major.  24 layers with tens of thousands of components?  Like I said, PCB Monkeys   Definitely never worked on anything like that.  I'm curious what would require a board with that many layers.  I've had stuff with a pretty high component count, but it has always been distributed between multiple boards connected by ribbon or something else.  Mostly large DAQ/control systems.  I suppose we could have squeezed things on a single board, but this would have been cost prohibitive and just a lot of needless work.

At any rate, even with the complexity you're talking about though, what does Altium do with regards to the PCB design that makes it so much better?  Specifically what features?  I'm just kicking the tires over here, so maybe I don't even know what I've got in front of me, but the core PCB features feel about the same as Eagle.

[krivx]

It'll take me a day to design the board after we have the circuit work done.

A guy on the Altium forum has done a board with 24 layers, 14k5 components, 32k vias, 59k pads, 9k5 nets. The board and revisions took over a year, the hours spent on it were described as too many to count.

Are there any images online? I'd love to see what the design files for such a complex layout look like.

[Rufus]

A guy on the Altium forum has done a board with 24 layers, 14k5 components, 32k vias, 59k pads, 9k5 nets. The board and revisions took over a year, the hours spent on it were described as too many to count.

Are there any images online? I'd love to see what the design files for such a complex layout look like.

I am pretty sure it was a sub-contract layout and would be commercially confidential. Altium struggled with the design his experience wouldn't actually be a good advertisement for Altium. On the other hand I believe he also has access to Cadence and Mentor tools. I don't know if the decision to use Altium was his or his customer's.

[Rufus]

At any rate, even with the complexity you're talking about though, what does Altium do with regards to the PCB design that makes it so much better?  Specifically what features?

You would have to ask someone who knows both packages. You could look at some of the Altium videos especially the 'design secrets' series then consider how/if you could do the same with Eagle.

[kphannan]

Out of curiosity, what is Altium written in now?   ... if it in fact is being ported to C# that is unfortunate as it does limit the final platform to be used on.

[Rigby]

Out of curiosity, what is Altium written in now?   ... if it in fact is being ported to C# that is unfortunate as it does limit the final platform to be used on.

Show me a person that can afford Altium but not Windows.