Homebrew PCBs

Eagle works great for me. You can start off with basic schematic/board 
editing.
As your skills and needs grow, you can get into more advanced things 
like
editing the parts libraries, writing scripts and ULPs, etc.

It's an excellent tool, and I feel privileged that they make a
free version available.

Regards,
   JJ

On Thursday, Mar 25, 2004, at 00:25 US/Eastern, emailw8nf wrote:

> I've been a lurker on here for a while.  I haven't seen much
> discussion of the layout software we experimenters like to use.
>
> The last time I did any "volume" of homebrew PCBs, I just used
> something like Microsoft Paint!
>
> But now, it seems there are many freeware or demoware software
> packages available for this work.  I'm curious what people tend to
> use, and what the particular benefits are of the package chosen?
>
> I've been using QCAD - has its ups and downs.  Good news it can output
> a Gerber file, which can then be manipulated in any Gerber viewer, and
> printed/zoomed, etc.  Also it ties together the schematic and the PC
> board, so once you're done with the schematic, you go to layout, move
> the parts around, and place traces to satisfy the rat's nest.  But a
> lot of this is clumsy, and doing re-work is very tedious.  It's also
> very time-consuming to create anything other than 90 degree straight
> lines with any accuracy.  For those of us who are trying to roll out
> PC boards for things like 300 watt UHF amplifiers, that limitation can
> be a killer.
>
> What do others use?
>
> Kindly,
>
> Dave
>
>
>
> Be sure to visit the group home and check for new Bookmarks and files:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Homebrew_PCBs
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
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