Moving away from Eagle

[Graz]

I've been an Eagle user for years. I know it has its warts, but I know my way around them, I'm fast with it and it's served me well. I have the hobbyist license (standard, but cheaper for non-commercial). I've been bumping into the board size limits. I'm still not planning to make any money, but I do want to build bigger boards. There is no "serious hobbyist" license. A "PRO" license is going to cost me $1K+, so before I make that investment for my hobby, I'm trying to evaluate whether I should switch to another solution.

Besides my accumulated knowledge and known-good parts library, the "killer feature" in Eagle for me is really good forward and back annotation between PCB and schematic. My flow is to create an empty schematic and board from the start, open both on my dual head system, and as I place large parts in the schematic (external connectors, mounting holes, major ICs and such), I put them in their places on the PCB. I begin routing when the schematic is close to done, but still go back and forth quite a bit. When I'm done, I'm done. This is a must-have feature for me.

Keeping in mind that the Eagle PRO license is effectively unlimited, should I spend that $1K elsewhere and take the opportunity to move to a (better?) package? All the packages I've looked at are either considerably more expensive, not really very good, or have severe restrictions (pins, layers, board size, etc.) at the ~$1K price point.

[BloodyCactus]

if I was spending money today, Diptrace. Tomorrow (tomorrow may never come), kicad might be worth a look (free), but right now its garbage with a convoluted schitzophrenic workflow of disparate tools stitched together  poorly, and poor to non existant libraries (but as ever, there is always tomorrow when they have all this cern work and a stable documented release you dont have to try and build from source).

other options might be circuit maker?

[steve_w]

Have a look at Diptrace, it is quite good and falls within your price range

regards

Steve W

[IanJ]

Keep your eye on AutoTrax DEX - http://kov.com/

Worth test driving and if the developer (lone guy) can fix a few issues then it'll be great.
Can import Eagle libraries as well as PCB's (not perfectly though).

Ian.

[MagicSmoker]

I've also been using EAGLE for years, but with a full commercial license (including the useless autorouter), and I also use it in a similar fashion to you (for example - I add decoupling caps to the schematic based on where stuff ends up on the board; it's virtually impossible to figure all of that out ahead of time) and I also have a considerable library of known-good parts I've built over the years.

So given what you've said, I would stick with the devil you know and pony up for the commercial license. I'm sure there are other packages that are better than EAGLE, but don't underestimate the amount of time you spent learning EAGLE's quirks as well as making all those library entries. Even if you assign the value of your time burger-flipping wages that's got to be worth a few grand right there.

[con-f-use]

KiCad will be a difficult to get used to but worth it. Don't get the ancient stable version, but one of the more recent ones from the last three month. It's completely free and coming from Eagle I can now say I like it better. Forward-backward annotation is not as seamless though, but more powerful. You absolutely have to watch Chris Gammel's "Getting to Blinky" videos when you do your first steps!

[tipofthesowrd]

I tend to agree.
I did the move the other way around, from KiCAD to Eagle, and was terribly frustrated with the Eagle way of working. 
I do agree about the annotation though. That was about the only part of Eagle I liked better.

Library additions do seem to go a lot quicker and simpler in KiCAD (if you can get past the initial library setup, but this is well documented if you search some topics here on the forum or Chris's great kicad.info site)

I've also been using EAGLE for years, but with a full commercial license (including the useless autorouter), and I also use it in a similar fashion to you (for example - I add decoupling caps to the schematic based on where stuff ends up on the board; it's virtually impossible to figure all of that out ahead of time) and I also have a considerable library of known-good parts I've built over the years.

So given what you've said, I would stick with the devil you know and pony up for the commercial license. I'm sure there are other packages that are better than EAGLE, but don't underestimate the amount of time you spent learning EAGLE's quirks as well as making all those library entries. Even if you assign the value of your time burger-flipping wages that's got to be worth a few grand right there.

This is certainly something you should consider. Making library entries takes time but there are some scripts which can do this for you:
https://github.com/DanChianucci/Eagle2Kicad

Or at least give you a good place to start.

[con-f-use]

And KiCan can import footprints directly from eagle.

[tggzzz]

Besides my accumulated knowledge and known-good parts library, the "killer feature" in Eagle for me is really good forward and back annotation between PCB and schematic. My flow is to create an empty schematic and board from the start, open both on my dual head system, and as I place large parts in the schematic (external connectors, mounting holes, major ICs and such), I put them in their places on the PCB. I begin routing when the schematic is close to done, but still go back and forth quite a bit. When I'm done, I'm done. This is a must-have feature for me.

Consider giving a quick spin to DesignSparkPCB.

It is cost-free, without limits, and I haven't found problems with reconciling changes in either direction. It is nominally Windows only, but I run V6 under Wine (without bothering to try the 3D modeling). Some complain about advertising, but it is limited to the splash screen and is therefore unobtrusive.

[Graz]

Thanks everyone for the tips. I have actually found a way around the board size limit in Eagle standard. I'm not going to resort to piracy. For my current project, I can finish up in Eagle. After that, I'll put aside some time to properly evaluate all the solutions suggested here before laying down cash. I have looked at most of them before but I'll be the first to admit that I haven't really given any of them a fair shake. If I do invest heavily in Eagle, then it's unlikely that I ever would look at the other alternatives.

[IanJ]

Thanks everyone for the tips. I have actually found a way around the board size limit in Eagle standard. I'm not going to resort to piracy. For my current project, I can finish up in Eagle. After that, I'll put aside some time to properly evaluate all the solutions suggested here before laying down cash. I have looked at most of them before but I'll be the first to admit that I haven't really given any of them a fair shake. If I do invest heavily in Eagle, then it's unlikely that I ever would look at the other alternatives.

I have an Eagle Pro license, but before that I was looking at ways around the pcb size limitations........and it crossed my mind for the very, VERY keen folks the following may work.

- Re-engineer all your library components 1/10th the size thay are now, i.e. scale them all down.
- Design your board, you'll effectively have 10 times the dimensions.
- Write a script so that when the gerbers are created the dimensions etc are all scaled up again.

Ok, I'll get my coat!

Ian.

[Feynman]

I'd have a look at DesignSpark.

I have to say, I only had a quick look at DesignSpark, but it is developed by the same company, that makes Pulsonix. Since I use Pulsonix professionally and like it pretty much, chances are that DesignSpark is good software as well.

[Zero999]

It's a bit different modifying the software so it will allow you to use the hardware you paid for than to pirate software.

In any case, it's not physically possible to own data such as software.

[GlowingGhoul]

It's a bit different modifying the software so it will allow you to use the hardware you paid for than to pirate software.

In any case, it's not physically possible to own data such as software.

I'm not sure I agree with that. Pirating your oscilloscope software so you can "use the hardware you paid for" can be applied to his PC. He's just stealing the software to "use the hardware he paid for". What's the difference, the fact that unlike scopes the PC software and hardware come from two different vendors?

[GlowingGhoul]

It's a bit different modifying the software so it will allow you to use the hardware you paid for than to pirate software.

In any case, it's not physically possible to own data such as software.

I'm not sure I agree with that. Pirating your oscilloscope software so you can "use the hardware you paid for" can be applied to his PC. He's just stealing the software to "use the hardware he paid for". What's the difference, the fact that unlike scopes the PC software and hardware come from two different vendors? If he has a Microsoft Surface tablet is it ok to pirate Microsoft software but not others?

[piranha32]

I've been an Eagle user for years. I know it has its warts, but I know my way around them, I'm fast with it and it's served me well. I have the hobbyist license (standard, but cheaper for non-commercial). I've been bumping into the board size limits. I'm still not planning to make any money, but I do want to build bigger boards. There is no "serious hobbyist" license. A "PRO" license is going to cost me $1K+, so before I make that investment for my hobby, I'm trying to evaluate whether I should switch to another solution.

Congratulations on good decision. Unfortunately you fell for a trap that I always warn people about: committing to a tool which is a money hole. I used to be avid Eagle user, until I realized that going beyond the size or number of layers limit is not as unlikely as I initially thought it would be. I decided to switch to Kicad and, with all the PITA Kicad can be, I never regretted  the decision. Fortunately I decided to switch when I had very few, and unimportant designs done in Eagle, so I did not have a big problem with migration.
Based on my experience, I recommend to settle on a tool which gives you room to expand, and which allows to easily upgrade to new versions. Unfortunately, if you do not plan to use the software for commercial projects, this eliminates most of the commercially available tools.

Keeping in mind that the Eagle PRO license is effectively unlimited, should I spend that $1K elsewhere and take the opportunity to move to a (better?) package? All the packages I've looked at are either considerably more expensive, not really very good, or have severe restrictions (pins, layers, board size, etc.) at the ~$1K price point.

IIRC major upgrades are not free. If you're not planning to make money with the software, I would recommend to choose free tools.