
CircuitMaker: a free PCB design tool powered by Altium - unwind
http://circuitmaker.com
======
jpwright
I work with PCB design tools a lot -- Cadence, Altium, Eagle, you name it.

While there's definitely room for better software, the most frustrating thing
about the PCB CAD ecosystem right now is (a) lack of interoperability between
file formats (for schematic, layout, and gerbers), and (b) lack of publicly
accessible components. It is a huge pain to build tons of component symbols
and footprints for each design. There are large EE companies that employ
people just for this task!

The idea of paying for more extensions seems incredibly frustrating. I'd
rather know what the cost will be upfront.

I am hopeful that eventually someone will clearly win this market by
creating/updating good, free software, in combination with open/convertible
file formats, a huge component database, and monetize via paid access to
special components/automatic component creation, or an integrated
manufacturing solution.

~~~
zakhomuth
Most of what you're asking for exists in Upverter.

* Our default account is free & open-source. * We've made UX a huge priority * We've got the largest and most complete component library in the world * We have an open source project for converting all of the ugly old propriety formats into an open, documented json format * We monetize through privacy similar to github

And we've built a whole bunch of magic into Upverter that none of the other
tools can even touch:

* 5 min setup: Nothing to install, maintain, no versions, no patches, no virtual machines, no need for Windows NT or some outdated OS to run the software etc. It's all online, pretty easy.

* Fully collaborative, and version controlled: You can see who made which change, when, roll changes back and fourth, including in editor issue tracking - all the same perks as designing software.

* Intuitive: Modern UI and UX, no infinite menus or buried features - our biggest user feedback is that Upverter is simply way, way easier to use than anything else.

* 10x Faster: parts are easier to create, you can do schematics and layouts at the same time, you can use open source parts, and build on open source reference designs, reuse modules... no syncing netlists, and no wasted effort.

* 10x cheaper: ($40 per user per month.) No huge upfront payment, and no hidden "maintenance" charges. Altium just jacked their prices up to $10K for a single user licence, Mentor and Orcad are just as bad and were seeing a lot of inbound because of it.

* Agile and responsive. Our support team is our dev team. If they can push some code to make your life easier overnight, it will happen. If you run into a problem, they will fix it in real time.

* Designed for growth. Sharing, collaboration, version control, flex users - you name it, its baked it. You wont run into a wall in 3 months, and you wont need to switch packages when you raise more money.

* Table stakes. It does everything that any of the other packages do. You dont have to give up any performance, complexity, or sophistication - so most of this is magic, extra, and unique to Upverter.

\+ More of our Magic Features: IPC generators / BGA generators, Generics,
Real-time design rule checking, Trace ghosting & Net highlighting when
routing, Fast toggle between schematic & layout / Multi monitor support, Auto
sync & save, Unlimited persistent undo, redo, In-design issue tracking, Fast
module creation for design reuse, Auto schematic routing, Flex users, sharing,
embedding, Real-time design collaboration, Cross probing

I really recommend you check it out! upverter.com

~~~
coryrc
Except there's absolutely no way I'm going to base my products (which could
last twenty years or more) around a SaaS website. I can still open designs
made in MS-DOS Protel (and have), while your company might be gone tomorrow. I
hate having to hack gerber files because I don't have the source and it really
limits changes.

~~~
paulgerhardt
The same thing could have been said about Github three years ago. We use
Upverter at Lockitron for one off's (factory test boards, misc. for fun hack
boards for our coffee machine, etc.) The tools aren't there today for mass
production stuff (more of a problem with the vendors than Upverter). I would
be surprised if this is always the case.

As Upverter grows, so will their applicable use cases. Online services have
this weird power-law thing going for them that software from a single vendor
can't keep up with on 5 year timescales.

~~~
coryrc
Git fully works without Github.

Can't even view your schematics if you stop paying every month to Upverter or
they close.

~~~
zakhomuth
We totally understand that fear. This is our approach to solving it:
[https://github.com/upverter/schematic-file-
converter](https://github.com/upverter/schematic-file-converter)

------
allegory
I've dealt with Altium before. In fact I was responsible for licensing their
product at a large manufacturing company.

There is no such thing as free. There has to be a catch. They are expert
milkers.

~~~
fr4
I agree, but Altium Designer really is very, very good and has been built over
almost 30 years. Unfortunately FOSS tools come nowhere near it.

~~~
stinos
This. I've used a couple of packages and AD is at the top of the line. Design
is a pretty difficult problem to solve which is one of the reasons FOSS, which
is usually created by a limited amount volunteers in their free time
especially for niche branches (i.e. not like a kernel for instance), has
trouble catching up with the work of larger amounts of full-time paid jobs
which are focused on just one thing.

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nwh
It's free as in "freemium". Unusable unless you spend a tonne of money on lots
of little in-app purchases.

~~~
unwind
Perhaps, I guess it's hard to be that certain about whether or not it's going
to be unusable before it's available.

I have no experience with Altium at all, I found this via Twitter and through
the EEVblog where it's been mentioned since the guy running the blog seems to
have hope/interest in it.

For me it'll probably not be very interesting, since I totally expect it to be
Windows only. What do folks with experience with Altium's products think?

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illumen
How does this compare to Fritzing?

[http://fritzing.org/home/](http://fritzing.org/home/)

~~~
andyjohnson0
Hard to tell, since CircuitMaker is apparently not available yet.

I like Fritzing. I'm just a hobbyist, but having tried other PCB layout tools
(Eagle, etc), Fritzing is the only one I've actually been able to be
productive with.

~~~
fallingmeat
Tried upverter?

~~~
andyjohnson0
Looks interesting, and I'll probably give it a try-out. But it seems to store
all design data in the "cloud" without the option to export it out, which
means I'd be unlikely to use it.

~~~
zakhomuth
Yes - The default is to stroe your data in the cloud.

But you can always download all of your designs in an open well documented
json format.

~~~
lumpypua
Does anything else have the capability to work with the json format? Or what
can I convert it into?

~~~
zakhomuth
See here: [https://github.com/upverter/schematic-file-
converter](https://github.com/upverter/schematic-file-converter)

~~~
lumpypua
Thanks man, very cool!

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jdswain
I guess it's too early to tell, but I'm hopeful that this will be good. We
don't know what the in-app purchases will be, or the price for them, but a
basic version of Altium for a low cost would be really nice. Personally I
don't mind paying something for this, but I can't justify anywhere near the
cost of full Altium for hobby projects. If I have to pay for a few features
that's fine.

~~~
danellis
I'm hoping the paid extras are things most hobbyists won't need, like
simulation and RF design tools.

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proee
We just released a new desktop version of "PCBWeb Designer"

[http://www.pcbweb.com](http://www.pcbweb.com)

This is a huge improvement of our original tool that relied on silverlight.

The project is a WPF application written in c# on .net - so right now it's
windows only. We are exploring options to port to other platforms using
Xamarin.

The tool is 100% free, with no limits on size or parts and includes full
gerber output.

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NextPerception
We use Altium daily at my office and the overwhelming consensus is that we
wish they would fix a lot of the bugs in Altium instead of spending time and
effort supporting a whole other program. You don't adopt another pet when you
have trouble remembering to feed your first pet.

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sgt
Will it be a web-based app or will it be a desktop application? If so, does
anyone know if it will run on OS X? A lot of the software tools in electronics
and circuit design seem to be Windows centric.

~~~
kasbah
Dave Jones said on the AmpHour podcast that it will be a Windows program but
files have to be stored online. Sounds like a deal breaker really.

~~~
NextPerception
It looks like a stripped down version of their professional Altium design
suite which is indeed a Windows program.

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gioele
Slightly offtopic: are there PCB design tools that are _text_ based?

I would prefer to _program_ a design, rather than _drawing_ it.

~~~
joshvm
Then essentially you want to write an autorouter. Modern autorouting is
incredibly powerful, but it's also incredibly stupid. You really need to know
exactly when to use it and how to set it up so that it fulfills all your
design requirements.

Part of the point of PCB design is that it's a _design_ process. You need to
make executive decisions about where you can place those components. Things
like connectors and interfaces absolutely need to be manually placed (or at
least have defined locations).

In principle what you're asking is simple - you pass in the netlist and
manually place important components and then let the autorouter do the rest.
In practice you have to think about:

\- Grounding schemes \- Differential traces \- Thermal management \- Isolation
\- Analog/Digital separation \- Grounding/stitch vias \- Potential room for
expansion in the future so board revisions have minimal impact

Don't forget that at least some of PCB design is 'artistic'. Your boards
should be beautiful!

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userbinator
This could be an attempt to capture some percentage of the userbase that
would've pirated Altium for personal use/learning, as is common for other
large expensive software e.g. Photoshop, AutoCAD, etc.

------
st3fan
This looks cool. But is it Windows-only?

~~~
Zuph
Per Dave Jones ([http://www.eevblog.com/](http://www.eevblog.com/)), yes.

