Hi everyone,

I'm working with the latest Altium Designer and having a bit of an issue. I wish to create very redundant PCB layouts, since I have many parts of my circuit repeating. I would like to keep the communication between the schematic and pcb parts. Also, the subblocks to be routed, need to be connected differently to the FPGA.

Does anyone have experience with making redundant layouts within the PCB?

Steve

 

I have no experience with that particular software, but I suggest that you search for Users' Groups on Google or other search engines.

Or, you could just go here:
http://www.altium.com/Community/Forums/

 

Wookie,

Thanks for the reply, but I cannot join the forum and ask questions unless I am a member. I cannot be a member without having a customer number, so you can see the dilemma. I was hoping someone was keen on that program here. I'm pretty good at using it, but I don't know a few things here and there.

Steve

 

I am a user of Altium Designer... but I don't understand your question.

Are you looking to create a hierarchical design? If so, I would suggest you think it over... five or six times. The idea of re-using portions of your schematics sounds great. Simply using it as you would use a function is a high level programming language. I've done it and it makes the schematic capture portion quick and easy. However, reading the schematics at a later date is very difficult. You are likely to get many complaints from the people who maintain the product (if that is you then it might be less of an issue). Another pain is the annotation. For each instance it appends some sub-string of characters so that you can identify to which instance it belongs. So, your reference designators become extremely long and your silkscreen gets cluttered. I prefer to stick with flat schematics. Cut and paste, reset designators, then automatically annotate.

If you are talking about PCB layout only. You can designate certain components to be members of a room. You can then route that room (sub circuit). When it's just like you want it, copy the attributes to the other identical rooms.

 

eeboy,

Thanks for the reply, I already use a hierarchical structure for creating schematics. It is a very clean way to go when you have a lot of repeated schematics.

I'm only referring to the layout. I have 8 exactly the same subcircuits to layout, except with different nets coming to and from them. I understand that rooms are created, but I don't know what you mean by assigning the same attributes? I really would like to route one channel of my design perfectly, then replicate them. Any thoughts?

Steve

 

Use the room toolbar to get access to the "Copy Room Formats" tool. Should do just what you want.

 

eeboy,

Thank you! That was exactly what I was looking for! You're awesome

Steve

 

I am a user of Altium Designer... but I don't understand your question.

Are you looking to create a hierarchical design? If so, I would suggest you think it over... five or six times. The idea of re-using portions of your schematics sounds great. Simply using it as you would use a function is a high level programming language. I've done it and it makes the schematic capture portion quick and easy. However, reading the schematics at a later date is very difficult. You are likely to get many complaints from the people who maintain the product (if that is you then it might be less of an issue). Another pain is the annotation. For each instance it appends some sub-string of characters so that you can identify to which instance it belongs. So, your reference designators become extremely long and your silkscreen gets cluttered. I prefer to stick with flat schematics. Cut and paste, reset designators, then automatically annotate.

If you are talking about PCB layout only. You can designate certain components to be members of a room. You can then route that room (sub circuit). When it's just like you want it, copy the attributes to the other identical rooms.

can you just help me in finding model files for few components like voltage regulators mosfet , comparators,etc in Altium designer (.ckt or any other)