any ideas on a good circuit sim program that doesnt use as much resources's as multi sim, i run the student version, and want a better less resource sucking program..

im running a intel celeron m 1.6Ghz with xp and 500Mb of ram...

any ideas would be helpful.

 

any ideas on a good circuit sim program that doesnt use as much resources's as multi sim, i run the student version, and want a better less resource sucking program..

im running a intel celeron m 1.6Ghz with xp and 500Mb of ram...

any ideas would be helpful.

use Circuit maker 2000

 

You can't even get CircuitMaker 2000 anymore and it's not supported by the vendor.

500 MB of RAM is pretty minimal. You would be far happier if you upgraded your RAM to 1GB than you would be if you went for a circuit simulator with lesser capabilities. It's really not all that expensive if you shop around; plus you can sell your old RAM online to recoup some of your costs. I picked up a gig of RAM for around $58 including shipping a year ago.

 

i know but my laptop is mainly used for tinkering, my Desktop is the workhorse i use it for most of my work, though while im away from home i carry my laptop, its a cheap'o dont realy want to dump to much into it, like i said its a celeron... my faith in those isnt to good so not putting any more money into it..

thanks though

 

Well, you can pick up a brand new laptop nowadays for around $600 or so.

Changing sims for just the sake of the outdated laptop would really be counterproductive. You'd lose out on support and the whistles & bells the later sims have. You likely would lose the ability to easily transfer designs from your laptop to your desktop, unless you downgraded it as well.

 

I'm not sure overall how much benefit could be induced from upgrading the memory for basic circuit sims - on XP it wouldn't get close to that I wouldn't think. Your problem is the Celeron which, to put it mildly, is pants particularly for intense processing.

I always found TINA to be a good light-weight simulation package, but it is not free.

You have options, but you will always be limited by your hardware, and sadly is not be feasible for you to replace your hardware for cost reasons.

Dave

 

Tina-TI is freeware. It's available from Texas Instruments' website.
http://www.ti.com/
Under "Design Support", click the "Analog eLab Design Center" link (2nd from last)
TINA-TI is the first item in the "Simulate" column (4th)

 

Tina-TI is freeware. It's available from Texas Instruments' website.
http://www.ti.com/
Under "Design Support", click the "Analog eLab Design Center" link (2nd from last)
TINA-TI is the first item in the "Simulate" column (4th)

I was referring to the circuit simulator by DesignSoft. Interesting there are two apps of similar nature with the same name - I wonder what the trademark lawyers would have to say about it.

Interesting suggestion of freeware, I have copied your post to the useful websites thread for future reference.

Dave

 

Interesting there are two apps of similar nature with the same name - I wonder what the trademark lawyers would have to say about it.

Interesting indeed. Not only the name, but the menus and operation appear very similar.

I have a demo version of the Designsoft package, aka "TINA Demo." http://www.designsoftware.com/ I'll download the Texas Instruments package and find out just how much they have in common.

 

Interesting indeed. Not only the name, but the menus and operation appear very similar.

I have a demo version of the Designsoft package, aka "TINA Demo." http://www.designsoftware.com/ I'll download the Texas Instruments package and find out just how much they have in common.

Hmm, wonder if there is a licensing agreement going on here, i.e. same package licensed by either TI or DesignSoft to the other.

It has been a number of years since I used TINA, but it is a very powerful package, and really easy to get into.

Let us know what you find.

Dave

 

I just found this: http://focus.ti.com/analog/docs/gencontent.tsp?familyId=02&genContentId=33361#g1

Explains the similarity.

 

I just found this: http://focus.ti.com/analog/docs/gencontent.tsp?familyId=02&genContentId=33361#g1

Explains the similarity.

Ahh, so it's like we expected. TINA-TI is just a stripped down free version of the full TINA software from DesignSoft.

Thanks for the info.

Dave