Anyone use Circuit wizard? How would you rate it?

[brett]

Hi
I'm thinking about buying a circuit layout program (I seem to spend a mountain of time each week converting schematics to PCB layouts).
I'd prefer something that is graphical and intuive to use.  I'm not worried if it doesn't have all of the "bells and whistles". 

Circuit wizard (v3.65) seems to have the basics at a very reasonable price (the standard version is around AUD $110 = US$80).
Anybody tried it?  Other products?
Thanks for any help.

I downloaded a Circuit wizard std demo (8MB) from here http://www.new-wave-concepts.com/cw_dl_st.html.

[R O Tiree]

As a SPICE simulator, it's not all that good. The components built into the program work fine. Trouble is, there aren't enough of them and there's no way to add your own from SPICE models. On the upside, the GUI is fantastic - you can change values of components on the fly while it's still running and you can click switches also while it's running. An awful lot of SPICE packages won't allow you to do this and there's an awful lot of wasted time with them, waiting for values in caps to stabilise and then find that you need to tweak a value, so you stop the sim, re-start, wait, etc, etc. Of course, there are timing commands to move switches, etc, but they're somewhat clunky to use. Circuit Wizard is a breeze in this respect.

If only you had the facility to "roll-yer-own" as it were, then Circuit Wizard would be a brilliant package. As it is, it's so-so.

[head_spaz]

I have it, and I don't care for it. In fact I don't like any of their products. It's a nice concept, but there's something missing in the implementation.
I occasionally use the livewire simulator, but only for drawing schematics. The simulation part of the program is a joke. The layout program is dumber than a box of rocks. I quit using it.
And none of their programs are stable, they hang my computer at the most inconvenient times, and this is the most stable computer I've ever had.
Even if this program were free, it would be more than it's worth in my opinion.  YMMV.

[fpaul]

I just started playing around with diptrace.  Super easy to do a schematic.  That's as far as I got so far.  It's free for non commercial use and has a great tutorial.  Tried a few other free ones but couldn't  figure them out.

[R O Tiree]

Just discovered another glitch with it this evening - it doesn't simulate JFET leakage at all well, so trying to simulate Boss- and Ibanez-style FET switching systems, you have to put the diode in the wrong way round... going to ring them tomorrow and find out WTHIH.

Agreed, the PCB layout part is mad as a box of frogs, but I've always preferred to do that bit myself, so it's no biggy.

[brett]

Thanks everyone for the feedback.
Sounds like it doesn't measure up, especially wrt PCB layout, which is the main feature that I wanted.
I'll keep using ExpressPCB and ExpressSch until I find the right package.

I'll definately download diptrace and give it a go.
thanks

[Auke Haarsma]

have you tried Eagle CAD?

It takes a little getting used to, but once you get the hang of it, it will be easy.  And there are lots of great tutorials on the web (eg AMZ and Gaussmarkov).

Freeware for non-commercial use at www.cadsoft.de. And it is available on Linux (if that matters to you at all).

[brett]

Hi again
I've downloaded and trialled the freeware version of DipTrace (a 32MB file).  My experience with it has been very positive and I'm going to continue with it.  It has enough capacity for simple circuits, but this free version is limited to 200 pins.  Any more than that and you'll need to break the circuit into smaller functional blocks or buy the full version.

Firstly, it does take a little getting used to (what software doesn't?).  Because there are a lot of options and a moderately complex interface, I found it necessary to do the tutorial (which is quite good and takes about 2 hours).  It is important to set appropriate defaults (such as labelling, trace width, number of layers, etc).  Some of the defaults are rubbish for our purposes.

Once I had the basics under control, I found it ok for doing schematics and good for doing layouts (muich better than doing manual layouts).  Watching the components move around when you run the optimiser is very cool.     So far I've found the error-checking routines very handy. 

An example of something that is slow and tedious to do by hand, but quick and easy with this  is a "copper pour", that covers (and therefore leaves the copper on) unused areas.
One of the best features is the compnent library of more than 50,000 devices.  Surpisingly though, I couldn't find some common devices (e.g. BD139, 2N3055 power transistors).  Fortunately, you can modify/customise components.

I haven't checked the SPICE simulations and some of the fancier options yet, but it's looking sweet.
cheers