Best free Schematic drawing program?

[Eb7+9]

essential tip for expressPCB ... 

will beer cross the border and make it to your house by mail ??

[juse]

TinyCAD is another good option:

http://tinycad.sourceforge.net/

I love open source stuff 

[John Lyons]

essential tip for expressPCB ... 

will beer cross the border and make it to your house by mail ??

JC
Ha! I know...I 'm still giddy every time I can print to pdf and have a nice crisp trace pattern.
It's the little things...

john

[frank_p]

I have been through probably a dozen programs through the ages. Right now I used Kicad. Not as shiny as other options but it is free and limitless and it runs on FreeBSD but there are win and mac ports.

Andrew

I've been looking some comments on the net this week and some users seems not to be able to migrate from XP to Vista when using Kicad.  Problems like not being able to save your custom footprints to the -Program Files- folder is looking to be a bottleneck.  I would like to use/learn Kicad but given the number of footprints you must do yourself (a lot of work), It would really be sad not to be able to using it if I/someone upgrade to Vista.

If you have some comments or opinions on that problem, let know...

[R.G.]

Anybody tried PCBArtist? (http://www.4pcb.com/index.php?load=content&page_id=46)

All the words look right at least. Looks like another "captive application" from the "Gerber free after first order" thing, but apparently you do get Gerber for pro manufacture after they get their first pound of flesh, unlike Express PCB.

[Zero]

After using ExpressSCH for a while, I moved to other schematic software, as I was annoyed by some user interface quirks in ExpressSCH ..  lines that weren't straight even you had snap-to-grid activated, etc.

Now I use a program called sPlan (http://www.abacom-online.de/html/splan.html)  ... which is not free however.. so ignore this part of my post 

I've been thinking about using Microsoft Visio (which I could get for free through some special deal while I was in university) for schematics. I already use it for lots of diagrams and for stompbox art, which I print out on clear labels.

I wonder which program Dano (BeavisAudio) uses for his layouts / schematics .. He has hands-down the most beautiful schematics and extremely cool graphic design in all of his projects.

~Lorenz

[owenjames]

I use Switchercad (primarily for simulating the circuits, but you can also save your schematics as a picture file).

I second switcherCAD as a free one, its nice to have a simulator as well as a schematic drawer (dont trust the simulator too much though it can come up with some "interesting" results). I now use Electronics workbench which was what i had in uni, its really good, but you have to pay for it.

[svstee]

After using ExpressSCH for a while, I moved to other schematic software, as I was annoyed by some user interface quirks in ExpressSCH ..  lines that weren't straight even you had snap-to-grid activated, etc.

I wonder which program Dano (BeavisAudio) uses for his layouts / schematics .. He has hands-down the most beautiful schematics and extremely cool graphic design in all of his projects.

~Lorenz

I've been using express SCH for a bit now, and it is fairly easy to use, but like you said it has some issues.

I also want to know what Dano is using, his stuff is always both readable and pro looking.

[davent]

After using ExpressSCH for a while, I moved to other schematic software, as I was annoyed by some user interface quirks in ExpressSCH ..  lines that weren't straight even you had snap-to-grid activated, etc.

I wonder which program Dano (BeavisAudio) uses for his layouts / schematics .. He has hands-down the most beautiful schematics and extremely cool graphic design in all of his projects.

~Lorenz

I've been using express SCH for a bit now, and it is fairly easy to use, but like you said it has some issues.

I also want to know what Dano is using, his stuff is always both readable and pro looking.

In this old thread Dano says he uses Visio, whether or not he still does ...? http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforum/index.php?topic=45678.msg335009;topicseen#msg335009

I've been using ExpressPCB for years now and have no complaints but this software does look interesting.   http://www.musicfromouterspace.com/SchematicEditorPromo/schematicpubwebpage.html  I like the idea that it generates a wire list and a parts list for you.

dave

[svstee]

The computer at my school have Visio 2003 loaded on them, and I was messing around with that a bit. I look to see how much it was, and I mostly saw stuff for 2007. I I just wanted the basic 2003, where could I get it?

[anchovie]

I just wanted the basic 2003, where could I get it?

Ebay. Doesn't mean it's cheap, though.

[The Tone God]

If you have some comments or opinions on that problem, let know...

I haven't used Kicad on windows. I also don't have a copy of XP or Vista to try it on. I'll try it on something I do have to see if there is a problem. One thing I do have to do under BSD is save my custom parts to my local space.

Andrew

[frank_p]

If you have some comments or opinions on that problem, let know...

I haven't used Kicad on windows. I also don't have a copy of XP or Vista to try it on. I'll try it on something I do have to see if there is a problem. One thing I do have to do under BSD is save my custom parts to my local space.

Andrew

Thank you Andrew (but don't do that work just for me...  I was just asking if someone had insight into those issues).  What I think I'll do is use it on XP and if I change for a more powerful computer and Vista O.S. : I will leave on the old computer with XP or install a Linux O.S.  I think that Kicad does not use that much power/speed, so putting it on an old machine seem a good avenue.  Being an open source application please me a lot on a DIYer point of view.  At first glimpse it seem to me as a very pleasing option.

Anyway, thanks for the suggestion Andrew !

FHP

[R O Tiree]

An essential tip for expressPCB and or expressSch:
Download a"virtual printer" such as cutepdf.
Then just print your work to file (is save as a pdf) and you have a 1:1 exact size copy of your board or schematic.
Otherwise you have to print screen and resize since you can't save work to import into any other editor
short of the "print screen" hack... Still giddy about findin this out

john

Maybe it's a quirk on my computer, but I discovered that I can select "Microsoft Office Document Image Writer" as my printer for ExpressPCB, which I have configured to save the file as a *.tif document at 300 dpi. That gets imported into PaintShop Pro where I can then clean up the image here and there as required before printing it out as a transparency for the UV box.

Areas for clean-up are things like when I want a trace to get thinner to go between the pins of another component - ExpressPCB does not do this well at all.

[davent]

Areas for clean-up are things like when I want a trace to get thinner to go between the pins of another component - ExpressPCB does not do this well at all.

Hi Mike,

With ExpressPCB, to run traces between pads i just pop a couple "corners" onto the too wide trace, either side of the pads then change the width of the piece of trace running between the pads. I did use your modify method to shrink traces on the Echo Base PCB linked in the EB thread as to my eye, the pads and traces were too close for comfort in a few places.  If i want lettering on the pcb I'll dump the ExpressPCB image into Paint so i've got a selection of fonts to work with, do the lettering and then print to PDF.

The light grey trace is 0.025" wide.


Take care
dave

[R O Tiree]

That's a very neat solution, Dave. Nice one! It's kind of what I end up doing in PaintShop Pro. Doesn't take long.