Hellfire
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 posted on 10/6/07 at 12:27 AM |
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Electronic Design Software
Hi guys,
I'm looking to design our own Digital Gear Indicator. I want it to display using a 0.8" 7 segment LED display, I want to use a light
dependent resistor to dull the display at night.
I want to know if there is any good software out there to help me with PCB design and calculation of values of components.
TIA - Steve
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Hellfire
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| posted on 10/6/07 at 12:39 AM |
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Is Eplan 5.4 any good?
Steve
[Edited on 10-6-07 by Hellfire]
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the_fbi
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| posted on 10/6/07 at 09:22 AM |
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For the PCB Design http://www.pad2pad.com/ is free and pretty good.
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Catpuss
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| posted on 10/6/07 at 01:07 PM |
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Dunno about eplan, but with a 270 day trial its worth a go.
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Bob C
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| posted on 10/6/07 at 07:43 PM |
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Couple of points:-
1) why LDR - you have sidelights, dipped and main beams to feedback the bright/dim ness.
2) I've tried a few free & cheap CAD systems and they are all useless apart from EAGLE - which is excellent!
3) as a result of '2' I have a comlete licenced copy of (I think) EDS II bought from farnell for a project. It is so sh1te it's
practically unuseable. If anyone wants it they can have it for nowt (cost me £300)
- ahh if I can find it - it's not in sight, I might have slung it - if anyone's interested I'll look a bit harder
Bob
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MikeRJ
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| posted on 11/6/07 at 07:48 AM |
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I'll second Eagle, it's a very capable package, though I did find it had a bit of a steep learning curve
compared to the PADs system I used at work.
Free PCB might be worth a look, the author seems to be supporting this very well. The main downside is it has no
schematic capture built in, but you can import netlists in the widely used PADS-PCB format format so the open source schematic capture tool
TinyCad can be used.
If you want to do any simulation I can thoroughly recommend SwitcherCad from Linear Technology,
it's an excellent (and free) Spice simulator and schematic capture tool.
[Edited on 11/6/07 by MikeRJ]
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iank
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| posted on 11/6/07 at 08:59 AM |
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I also use eagle (on Linux). You can send the files directly to some PCB manufacturers without any conversion hassle (I use
http://www.pcb-pool.com/)
The free version doesn't autoroute but I find doing that chore strangely therapeutic (it has a limited size which isn't a limitation for
a gearchange indicator and is limited to 2 layers which also won't be a problem)
[Edited on 11/6/07 by iank]
--
Never argue with an idiot. They drag you down to their level, then beat you with experience.
Anonymous
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Hellfire
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| posted on 14/6/07 at 09:53 AM |
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Many thanks - I'm trying eplan for now...
Thread closed.
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