How to paste the same layout multiple times?

[Dago]

I'm making an ADC-board which has four identical channels. How can I lay out one channel and repeat the same layout for the rest of the channels?

I'm 100% certain I have done this previously just by copying the layout and pasting and changing the reference designators to correct ones and renewed design from schematic. I'm not sure if something has changed or if I just happen to have my reference designators differently but this does not seem to work anymore.

When changing the reference designators if I try to input a designator that already exists it only gives me an option to "shift" the numbers forward for the following ones. Which means that the reference designators I have already previously fixed/changed can get changed to the wrong ones yet again. Only thing I can think of is renumbering the refdes in my schematic so that they always get bigger when going from channel to channel but this is a fairly big job. The automatic renumbering might do the job, maybe.

Is there any sensible way to do this? There seems to be some "group into component" at least but I'm not sure how to use it.

[Falcon69]

There is a copy Matrix tool under EDIT

Select the parts you want to copy, then a select EDIT Tab, then Select Copy Matrix, then it asks you columns and rows and the spacing for them.

It's a nice little tool.

ANother nice tool I noticed in this new version, is You can now group things together, and rotate as group.

[Dago]

There is a copy Matrix tool under EDIT

Select the parts you want to copy, then a select EDIT Tab, then Select Copy Matrix, then it asks you columns and rows and the spacing for them.

It's a nice little tool.

ANother nice tool I noticed in this new version, is You can now group things together, and rotate as group.

Thanks for the tip! I was not aware of this tool but it does not seem to solve my problem. Even if I copy the block the refdes will be wrong and when I do renew design from schematic it will mess everything up.

I found a "barely good enough" -solution, there is an option "keep refdes when pasting" in edit menu, I put that on then copied and renamed the refdes and it barely worked.

I find it very amusing that this is still easier/better than in eagle and this is pretty horrible... Why can't you just have proper hierarchy blocks or repeat patterns, shouldn't be difficult to implement...

[Kremmen]

Make the ADC channel a subcircuit, the use that subcircuit in your schematic. When you get to the layout part there are tools available to replicate a subcircuit layout without messing the references or other features.

[Dago]

Make the ADC channel a subcircuit, the use that subcircuit in your schematic. When you get to the layout part there are tools available to replicate a subcircuit layout without messing the references or other features.

Really? I've tried playing around with the hierarchical blocks and they do not seem to reflect in any way to the layout side. Do you mean the hierarchical blocks or something else?

[Kremmen]

Yes, i do. They definitely reflect on the layout side if you use the feature there. I only used it once and now i am not quite sure if it only did the component placement or if it did the routing as well. I'd have to check but i'll be busy with other things until tomorrow evening so it will have to wait.