Electronics > Beginners
Why am not able to get a grasp of PCB designing?
NivagSwerdna:
--- Quote from: Rerouter on November 12, 2019, 11:20:24 am ---Nivag, Why would anyone want to lock themselves in with software that limits what they can do, e.g. pay $1000 USD to not be limited, vs spend an amount of time learning the tool like approaching diptrace would involve. I'm personally unclear what diptrace offers that would make me be willing to pay that amount + the time investment to relearn a locked down tool?
--- End quote ---
Useability.
But shockingly I just checked and it is no longer free! Not For Profit (500 pins, 2 signal layers) is still free if you ask them nicely.
cgroen:
Also remember that many times you can move I/O around on the CPU to get a cleaner layout!
Other than that, experience, experience and experience. Start with something simpler, make a lot of layouts. Eventually you will "just do it" :)
jhpadjustable:
--- Quote from: cgroen on November 12, 2019, 01:41:45 pm ---Also remember that many times you can move I/O around on the CPU to get a cleaner layout!
Other than that, experience, experience and experience. Start with something simpler, make a lot of layouts. Eventually you will "just do it" :)
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OP misspoke. It's not a SoC and it's not a microcontroller. It's just a switching converter with a lot more pins and power steering than one might be used to.
NivagSwerdna:
OK... I'll try and be a bit more constructive...
8)
Looking at the datasheet and schematic suggests that you should (as some suggested earlier) forget about size constraints for now and work radially out from the chip.
e.g. the LEDs all need to live on the side nearest their pins, etc. and likewise each output should be put radially out from where they connect
... so put the chip in the middle and arrange the connections around them at an angle that reflects the majority of their connections.
You can then squish it together later
I would aim to route all non-ground nets first and come back to a ground flood later.
(The caps need to go where they are intended... so for example a decoupling cap should really be close to where it is meant to decouple... that can get lost in translation if you aren't careful)
rstofer:
ExpressPCB (classic) doesn't do autorouting but what it does do is link the layout to the schematic. So, when I click on a pin that might be Clk, say, all pins on that net are highlighted. All I have to do is lay down a trace. Inevitably, I have to reroute some traces but it usually works out fine.
That rat's nest is useless. It provides no information about how to lay things out other than "it's a mess".
I haven't used any of the more sophisticated PCB programs, I have always been happy with ExpressPDB (classic).
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