Veroboard or perfboard

[Meehah]

I am making a small lm386 amplifier to take on a holiday and was wondering if laying it out on Veroboard or perfboard would be more effective. The layout I am going to follow is the Little Gem. My past experience is that Veroboard can be incredibly tedious. Keep in mind that I am not very experienced with soldering or DIY electronics. Does anyone have any ideas?

[jimilee]

More effective is your decision. I can't use perf but I can make vero work.


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[Jdansti]

If I have a Vero layout already done for me, I'll use it before I would do perf. I can do Vero pretty quickly, but that may be because I've done it a lot. Perf takes a little more thinking for me than using a Vero layout.

Edit: In the end, it's a personal decision based on your skills.

[Mark Hammer]

If one has any plans to mod a circuit, vero can be a problem.  I prefer perf because I can put things any way I want, and easily add parts or change the layout.

I also tend to build a lot of things that people post here or are posted around.  If I find I don't like it as much as I thought I would, I can reclaim the perfboard.  I've tried reclaiming vero, but it tends to be limited.

[287m]

my history, started with vero, just because my uncle have a lot of big vero and teach me how to build with vero
and vero is rare in here, so become special if use vero
unfortunately, after stock vero is zero, is too long to get vero via online shopping
in that time, with just knowledge on vero
just build in perf with vero style (bend the leg, no need for cutting hole)

THEN, after view 'the clean' Rick Holt frequencycentral build on perf
i jealous! decided to move on to perf, almost always
and perf is easy convert to pcb layout, vice versa
THEN, view Sijosae, the mini masochist guru on headphone amp
you must say for yourself, if he can build like that, why i can't?

for me, the best part in perf, is easy to use onboard switch, led, and pots wannabe

and yeah, my first onboard pots layout is ruby bassman 

[davent]

Perf now far exceeds my patience limit, i find vero a snap. And that said i just about always DIY a pcb for everything and do have few commercial boards to wrap up.

dave

[karbomusic]

Really up to the person. I began with Vero, got pretty good at it; it became too time consuming for larger builds for me personally. Then I began etching PCBs and that's pretty much all I've done since - far more accurate in far less time IMHO/YMMV. If quick, small and a one off, I might use Vero.

[Elijah-Baley]

I built my circuit only on veroboard. I found it quick, some cut trace, some jumper, and the board is ready to solder.

When I plain to build a pedal I get all information, experiences, schematics, variations, mods, adding and improving about it. Then, starting from a layout I find on internet, I try to modify it as I would or I need, putting socket for some components I wanna test. I take my time, but in the end I am satisfied with my pedals.
I believe Mark Hammer, sometime you can't modify too much a circuit on veroboard just built, but almost all my pedals have some extra then the original layout I found (TS808, DOD 250, Rub-a-Dub Reverb Deluxe, Bazz Fuss, Rat, BSIAB, Smokey Amp...). It's enough plain the mods before to start to build.
And when I wrong or forget something I learnt for the next time.

[romans10:9]

So on pedals is it ok to shave away some of the board to make space for pots and such? Thanks for your time. God bless.-paul chavez


For God so loved the world that he gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16

[Jdansti]

So on pedals is it ok to shave away some of the board to make space for pots and such? Thanks for your time. God bless.-paul chavez

Yes. It's ok to shave the end of tracks on vero, but make sure you don't have a sliver of copper that is left over and shorting adjacent tracts. On PCBs, make sure there are no traces where you are shaving.

[anotherjim]

I can think of one way Vero scores over perf for an amp. The 386 relies on its contact pins for heat dissipation, so soldering into vero tracks gives a bit more area of metal for the heat to go in than perf would do. Actually, clean guitar barely warms a 386, but the moment you have it clipping or feed it a fatter signal from a distortion, it will get hotter. One of the few cases I would solder in a chip rather than socket it.

[suncrush]

Vero's where it's at for me.  Easier to cut traces than solder bridges.

[blackieNYC]

I don't use vero, only perf - but I was also going to say that the fact that it is a power amp makes me think vero is better for you.
Or is it? Soldering leg-to-leg passes signal thru as much metal as vero trace offers, in terms of carrying current.

[Jdansti]

^The amount of current in the little amps and other circuits we create would be fine going through teeny traces on a PCB. Vero and perf are equally suitable in this regard. Vero vs perf is all about personal effort and how each person's brain views the situation.

I'll expand on what I said earlier. If I find a Vero layout that someone else has already figured out, I would use it before I would create a perf circuit. But if I have to start from scratch from a schematic, it's easier for me to use perf than to figure out the how the layout would look on Vero. I could create a Vero layout, and I have, but I'm too lazy to do it every time. In the end, the effect or amp sounds the same whether it's done on Vero or perf.