Orcad -vs- Tango Pro?
Andrew W Deweerd
of one of these (to replace the CO$TLY Cadence ECAD). Which is better
for schem, schem capture, brd layout & routing, etc. We are leaning
toward Orcad.
BTW, does anyone know how well these apps serve over a Novell 3.12 net?
/* ANDREW DEWEERD */
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#include <stddisclaimer.h>
Sam Goldwasser
> The subject line says it all. We (my co.) are going to buy several seats
> of one of these (to replace the CO$TLY Cadence ECAD). Which is better
> for schem, schem capture, brd layout & routing, etc. We are leaning
> toward Orcad.
You are not going to like my answer: I like to use OrCad for schematic
capture and Tango PCB+ (not the windows version) for layout with their
Tango Route Pro (not the windows version) for autorouting. We have done
and are doing boards with 6-10 signal layers, 6 mil design rules, 200 or
more equivalent ICs, about 12"x12".
My primary complaint about the Windows version of Tango PCB is speed - it
is easily a factor of 5 times slower than the DOS version for designs of
similar complexity. I also prefer the PCB+ user interface.
I like OrCad for schmatic capture because it is simple to use, fast on any
kind of PC (from 8088 to Pentium), and can handle whatever complexity
we throw at it.
Tango PCB+ has a very nice user interface and is fairly fast on 486 and
above machines. I never particularly liked OrCad's PCB packages (but have
not evaluated them in quite some time).
> BTW, does anyone know how well these apps serve over a Novell 3.12 net?
Don't know.
--- sam
David Fowler
s...@colossus.stdavids.picker.com says...
I agree with Sam... I use Orcad (the older version, not the newer SDT
package) for may sch work and Protel for DOS for my PCB layout work. I
wrote a batch file which does the conversion work to get the Orcad netlist
and partfields into Protel.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
David Fowler,Vice President,Starlink Incorporated, 512-832-1331
Starlink provides products & services for professional (D)GPS users
Mark G. Forbes
the schematic side. I've used other packages (and I'm stuck with
Tango Pro for Windows right now) and Orcad is easily the best of
the lot. I hated the SDT III interface initially, but they fixed
many of my biggest gripes and once I re-learned things it was
actually pretty slick. A lot of it was figuring out that it *would*
in fact do what I wanted, if I set things up right to start with.
I'd buy it again tomorrow, if I could. Unfortunately, the company-
wide decision was made before I signed on, so I'm stuck with Tango.
For board layout, I've had great success with PADS. The PADS <-->
Orcad interface works well, and if you do your libraries sensibly
it's nearly seamless. Don't let the Tango claims of seamless data
transfer sway you; there's far more headaches getting the
data from Tango schematic over to Tango PCB.
I haven't yet felt that I can really trust the Tango tools. They
change things fairly often, there are nasty bugs lurking in the
corners, and their support sucks. While Orcad isn't perfect, I
haven't used it to generate a netlist that turned out to be lying.
That's not true of some other packages. :-(
PADS provided a nice board-layout package. I didn't like their
schematic entry program, but that's ok. Neither package was
dreadfully expensive, Orcad doesn't require a key, and PADS can
be unlocked by those nice people up in Canada. Not that we would
copy this for unauthorized use, but it was nice not to have to
keep the stupid key plugged into the already-overloaded parallel
port. It stayed in a lockbox with the master disks.
--
for...@peak.org
Mark G. Forbes
"I am the person my parents warned me about."
Gordon Pritchard
>From: for...@peak.org (Mark G. Forbes)
>Subject: Re: Orcad -vs- Tango Pro?
>Date: Fri, 26 May 95 00:17:43 PST
My $0.02:
Orcad works. I even get netlists out that I can use as a _basis_ for
Spice simulation (note that the netlist is only about 1/2 the work actually
necessary for simulation :-/
As an engineer, I have a wierd perspective on schematics: I view them as
a necessary "servicing roadmap" whose greatest functionality appears perhaps
10 years down the road. In contrast, I suspect many in this newsgroup view
the schematic as an input step to laying out the PCB. This affects my overall
perception of Orcad: Their symbols are kludgy, and schematics are not "nice"
to look at. Annotation capability could certainly be better. Documenting
expected waveforms right on the schematic is impossible (with the DOS version
I have).
That aside, Orcad is "open" and extensible, with accessible and
customizable parameters for all devices, etc. It does work. As a launch
point to laying out a PCB you will be satisfied, I expect. Personally, I
prefer to go for something that does all the above, and can look as nice as
the nicest example of _published_ schematics (SAM'S, Heathkit, military
service manuals). Haven't found such an animal, quite yet! PADS-Logic
does an OK job, particularly when a lot of manual drawing and annotation is
added to the vellum plot (using a drafting table and a *gasp* pencil...)
FWIW,
Gordon Pritchard (gpri...@vanieee.wimsey.bc.ca)
Frank Miles
>Here's another vote for Orcad (even the SDT III version!) for
>the schematic side.
Yes! to OrCad.
>...
>For board layout, I've had great success with PADS.
I used to think PADS had too many bugs, had too weird an interface
(old DOS version). That was with last employer. Now, however....
>....(another respondent praising PROTEL)
Protel / Windows has a lot of features, a lot of promise, but it has
*lots* of bugs. Their bug-fixes tend to be in new versions, containing
ever-new features (so they want you to pay for the bug fixes).
I'd go back to PADS anyday if our budget could tolerate it.
Don't know what the *new* Orcad-PCB is like. The old one was really bad.
-frank
Ran Talbott
>I'm stuck with Tango Pro for Windows right now
Which probably has a lot to do with your preference for Orcad ;-)
From the little I've seen of Tango for Windoze, I wouldn't accept
it as a gift. Otoh, I've been using the DOS version for a few years
now, and have found the versions that have come out since about
1993 to be pretty clean. The worst bug I've encountered was a
bogus error message caused by a rounding error somewhere (it
said a connection didn't exist because it miscalculated either the
wire or pin location by a couple of mils).
>I hated the SDT III interface initially, but they fixed
>many of my biggest gripes and once I re-learned things it was
>actually pretty slick. A lot of it was figuring out that it *would*
>in fact do what I wanted, if I set things up right to start with.
And how many weeks did it take you to do the set-up and
re-learning? The Red Guard sentenced people to shorter, and
less painful, "re-education".
The Tango user interface is much more "accessible", especially
for someone like me who only does PCB design as one aspect
of engineering work. *Maybe* the Orcad learning curve
would be worth it to someone specializing in PCB design,
but I have my doubts.
Plus there's the "eyestrain factor": Orcad seems to have
contracted out their screen and printer driver design to
some Third World country where CGA monitors and 9-pin
printers are still considered "high tech". I got better-looking
output when I was hand-jobbing schematics with my Mac
and Imagewriter 10 years ago.
Maybe the (overdue) Windoze upgrade will address some
of this. I hope so, because I dislike being stuck with
running Tango full-screen. I'd do it most of the time,
anyway, but there are occasions when I'd like to be
able to do it windowed. And I have serious doubts about
the Tango people ever mastering Windoze. But, for the
moment, Orcad is acting as an expensive bookend on one
of our manuals shelves.
Ran
Svenn Are Bjerkem
>In <3q3vo1$r...@odo.PEAK.ORG> for...@peak.org (Mark G. Forbes) writes:
>
>>I'm stuck with Tango Pro for Windows right now
>
>>many of my biggest gripes and once I re-learned things it was
>>actually pretty slick. A lot of it was figuring out that it *would*
>>in fact do what I wanted, if I set things up right to start with.
>
Although doing a lot of PCB work I haven't encountered a package which
satisfies my needs. Protel made a program for dos called Autotrax a couple of
years ago (or centuries?). The schematic part is, for me, unusable because of
the low number of library parts. The user interface stinks.
I got my hands on the draft schematics program from OrCAD which had a big
library, and the possibility to create macros. Still user interface stink.
The PCB part of Autotrax is ok, but the router stink, so I have to route
manually. Once I managed to use the PCBII package of OrCAD it showed good
autorouter capabilities, but the library was little, and the library editor
is something of the worst I have ever encountered.
How do we solve this problem? Draft exports a tango netlist. Traxedit imports
tango netlist, BINGO. A friend of mine wrote a filter to get library parts
right and off we went. This is how I solve problems today. Lokking for better
solutions, though.
>And how many weeks did it take you to do the set-up and
>re-learning? The Red Guard sentenced people to shorter, and
>less painful, "re-education".
I spent Eastern hollidays to figure out PCBII and I managed to figure out
SDTIII at the same time. Anyone better?
>
>The Tango user interface is much more "accessible", especially
>for someone like me who only does PCB design as one aspect
>of engineering work. *Maybe* the Orcad learning curve
>would be worth it to someone specializing in PCB design,
>but I have my doubts.
I have only encountered Mentor Graphics user environment on the worse side of
OrCAD. The package is being used at my university, and boy, it stink. I can
imagine that the companies using Mentor is paying their Mentor engineers a
lot of money not to leave. It takes so much time to learn that system (not to
mention the price) and only ASIC people would want to try someting like that.
I have routed a mixed digital/analog PCB on Mentor BoardStation, and the
algorithms are very good, though.
OrCAD is, as far as I know, just a bunch of different programs with SDTIII
menu system on top (Just like Mentor got a menu driven shit pile of different
packages) Learning to use one part of the package does not imply that
learning other parts is easier afterwards.
>
>Plus there's the "eyestrain factor": Orcad seems to have
>contracted out their screen and printer driver design to
>some Third World country where CGA monitors and 9-pin
>printers are still considered "high tech". I got better-looking
>output when I was hand-jobbing schematics with my Mac
>and Imagewriter 10 years ago.
If you use the plotall.exe dos program instead of the menu item print, you
get nice postscript files. I have tried to run draft in 1024 x 768 solution,
but fonts are too small. The rest is ok. 800 x 600 works well, but I like to
see most of my schematic when I work. Probably something wrong with me.
>
>Maybe the (overdue) Windoze upgrade will address some
>of this. I hope so, because I dislike being stuck with
>running Tango full-screen. I'd do it most of the time,
>anyway, but there are occasions when I'd like to be
>able to do it windowed. And I have serious doubts about
>the Tango people ever mastering Windoze. But, for the
>moment, Orcad is acting as an expensive bookend on one
>of our manuals shelves.
I am (so far) impressed by the demo version of CIRCAD, which have been
commented on this group. I personally like the policy of the company which
make a fully usable package avaliable for testing. I have yet not done
anything seriously big, so I might get dissapointed sometime down the line.
I have just one suggestion to the company, ant that is to put in the preroute
part of the autorouter so that you can get rid of ratnests already routed. Of
course that would probably make less people buy the pro package, but I need
to use a package for really serious work a couple of times before I make up
my mind.
I have also tried to get the protel 2.0 demo, but the files on leonardo (the
bwcc.dl$ file) was corrupt both in the zip and unzip directory. Somebody in
charge reading this, do something? Protel is promising, I've heard, and from
what I read on caltech protel www page it sounds like something to try out.
>
>Ran
>
--
Svenn Are Bjerkem
Dave Dilatush
>Here's another vote for Orcad (even the SDT III version!) for
>the schematic side. I've used other packages (and I'm stuck with
>Tango Pro for Windows right now) and Orcad is easily the best of
>the lot. I hated the SDT III interface initially, but they fixed
>many of my biggest gripes and once I re-learned things it was
>actually pretty slick. A lot of it was figuring out that it *would*
>in fact do what I wanted, if I set things up right to start with.
>I'd buy it again tomorrow, if I could. Unfortunately, the company-
>wide decision was made before I signed on, so I'm stuck with Tango.
I'm in a similar situation at work. I use OrCAD now (with SDT
III) and really like it; it does everything I need it to do and
doesn't bother me with a lot of glitzy features that are of no
real use. It's simple and reliable.
Nevertheless our management is shoving Mentor's Design Architect
Rev. 8.2 down our throats as the "best" capture package because
it interfaces "seamlessly" with BoardStation.
DA is so overcomplicated that no one has used it successfully
yet. We use it only infrequently and the learning curve is so
ferocious we all keep making huge mistakes.
Is this also the case with Tango Pro?
Joel Kolstad
>
>I have only encountered Mentor Graphics user environment on the worse side of
>OrCAD. The package is being used at my university, and boy, it stink. I can
>imagine that the companies using Mentor is paying their Mentor engineers a
>lot of money not to leave. It takes so much time to learn that system (not to
>mention the price) and only ASIC people would want to try someting like that.
They're teaching it to a lot of EE undergrads at the University of Wisconsin -
Madison these days. Adding Mentor Graphics to your resume might be worth the
learning curve.
It does take a long time to learn, and is incredibly annoying at times, but it
can do just about everything under the sun. Perhaps there's a better way to
do the user interface, but the power you can unleash with Mentor is so great
that you can overlook the pain that it now is.
---Joel Kolstad
Carlos Hidalgo
seats AWD>of one of these (to replace the CO$TLY Cadence ECAD). Which
is better AWD>for schem, schem capture, brd layout & routing, etc. We
are leaning AWD>toward Orcad.
In my opinion, athough I think Tango is probably the "better" of the
two, I would go with Orcad for a couple of reasons. One, Orcad is less
expensive. And more importantly, Orcad is supported by many FPGA vendors
as a front end (schematic capture) for their proprietary software
(Xilinx, Actel, and others.)
AWD>BTW, does anyone know how well these apps serve over a Novell 3.12 net?
carlos....@pcohio.com Digital Laboratories Inc.
---
ş SLMR 2.1a ş We all live in a yellow subroutine.
_ _ --------------------------------------------------------------
|_|_| PC-Ohio PCBoard OLS pcohio.com HST 16.8: 216-381-3320
|_|_| The Best BBS in America Cleveland, OH V34 28.8: 216-691-3030
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Mark G. Forbes
>III) and really like it; it does everything I need it to do and
>doesn't bother me with a lot of glitzy features that are of no
>real use. It's simple and reliable.
>
>Nevertheless our management is shoving Mentor's Design Architect
>Rev. 8.2 down our throats as the "best" capture package because
>it interfaces "seamlessly" with BoardStation.
>
>DA is so overcomplicated that no one has used it successfully
>yet. We use it only infrequently and the learning curve is so
>ferocious we all keep making huge mistakes.
>
>Is this also the case with Tango Pro?
Not too much. It's probably no worse than Orcad to learn, but I
find it's in my way too much. The biggest thing I miss is macros;
with Orcad they're easy, with Tango they're a pain in the neck.
There *is* a macro feature in Tango, but when you call them to
ask why it doesn't seem to work, they say, "Oh yeah, that doesn't
actually work, but we left it in the product anyway. We always
use the Windows Recorder utility, and it mostly works, sometimes."
A real confidence-builder.
It's particularly apparent when doing things like adding component
attributes...internal part numbers and such. With Tango it's tedious,
with Orcad it's quick and easy.
Another misfeature of Tango is the way it tenaciously keeps
things attached to each other when you're moving parts around.
In the case of power, for example, if you change
the name of a power-thingie in Orcad, it's tied to the new power
net you've just declared. In Tango, the name will change but the
net-connectivity *doesn't*. And it isn't obvious until you discover
all sorts of stuff attached to VCC that was supposed to be on VBB.
The little power-thingies all say VBB, but when you finally get down
to the pin-assignment box, it's grayed-out and assigned to VCC. The
only way to change it is to delete every instance. add port-symbols
to every point to change the net-assignments over, then re-add the
power symbols back in again from scratch. Not obvious, and easy to
screw up. The result is that you've got to hand-check the netlist,
since you can't absolutely believe what you get otherwise. I never
had that problem with Orcad.
Dave Dilatush
[re Tango Pro complexity v. OrCAD]
>It's probably no worse than Orcad to learn, but I
>find it's in my way too much. The biggest thing I miss is macros;
>with Orcad they're easy, with Tango they're a pain in the neck.
>There *is* a macro feature in Tango, but when you call them to
>ask why it doesn't seem to work, they say, "Oh yeah, that doesn't
>actually work, but we left it in the product anyway. We always
>use the Windows Recorder utility, and it mostly works, sometimes."
>A real confidence-builder.
It must be! I've always thought it ironic that with CAD software
costing thousands of dollars, there appears to be a much looser
"bugginess" standard than what applies to personal software
products or even to shareware. CAD vendors sometimes seem to
think nothing about advertising a feature and then leaving it to
the buyer to figure out, too late, that the feature doesn't work
right.
I agree that OrCAD's macro features are VERY nice. I use them
all the time- a few mouse clicks and a few keystrokes, and you've
got a brand-new macro that makes the job at hand a lot easier.
It's so easy to create them I don't even really think about it
while I'm doing it.
>It's particularly apparent when doing things like adding component
>attributes...internal part numbers and such. With Tango it's tedious,
>with Orcad it's quick and easy.
The Mentor DA's component "properties" are equivalent to OrCAD's
"part fields" and are just as easy to add or modify; but you have
to be EXTREMELY careful not to screw around with any of the
pre-defined properties because you can totally garf up board
layout or simulation or both and end up with a titanic mess.
>Another misfeature of Tango is the way it tenaciously keeps
>things attached to each other when you're moving parts around.
>In the case of power, for example, if you change
>the name of a power-thingie in Orcad, it's tied to the new power
>net you've just declared. In Tango, the name will change but the
>net-connectivity *doesn't*. And it isn't obvious until you discover
>all sorts of stuff attached to VCC that was supposed to be on VBB.
>The little power-thingies all say VBB, but when you finally get down
>to the pin-assignment box, it's grayed-out and assigned to VCC. The
>only way to change it is to delete every instance, add port-symbols
>to every point to change the net-assignments over, then re-add the
>power symbols back in again from scratch. Not obvious, and easy to
>screw up. The result is that you've got to hand-check the netlist,
>since you can't absolutely believe what you get otherwise. I never
>had that problem with Orcad.
But isn't there a similar problem in OrCAD with the invisible
power pins on devices? For instance, if I lay down a bunch of
TTL devices, I end up with VCC and GND nets in the netlist; if I
add CMOS devices I get VDD and VSS, which are separate from VCC
and GND. If I add a CD4051 analog mux, I get VDD, VSS, and VEE.
Same thing with linear circuits that have invisible power pins,
they have their own power pin names which OrCAD wants to default
to.
I've been working around this by placing dummy power objects on
the sheet, one for each default-named power pin on the devices
I'm using, and then connecting these together to a module port
named with the power or ground net name I want. The OrCAD docs
suggest doing this as a way of controlling power net naming,
since it is apparently a rule that module port net names
supercede power object net names in a sort of "rock cuts
scissors" relationship.
Now that I know how to handle the problem, it's certainly no big
difficulty; but it was a real bear figuring it out the first
time. But am I ignoring an easier workaround?
While on the subject of OrCAD docs, let me say that I've found
them absolutely atrocious. They're complete, and they're
accurate; but man what a chore it is to find what you're looking
for in them! I got the impression the people writing the manuals
didn't have a very good feel for how people look up information
when they need it: seems like every time I try to find some
Global Cosmic Universal Principle I end up having to slowly leaf
through the manual page by page, until I finally find what I'm
after buried in some parenthetical note way back on page 487.
What are the Tango docs like? Mentor's documentation is very
thorough, but it's all on-line and I'm NOT a fan of on-line
documentation. I prefer books.
>--
>for...@peak.org
>Mark G. Forbes
>"I am the person my parents warned me about."
Dave Dilatush
Dave Dilatush
Mark G. Forbes
>placing dummy power objects on the sheet [.....] Now that I know
>difficulty; but it was a real bear figuring it out the first
>time. But am I ignoring an easier workaround?
Nope, that's one way I've done it too. In Tango you can fish
around in the Pin Attributes window and change the net connection
on a chip. They're still hidden, just like Orcad. What I do in
real life is to always pull my parts from *my* library. I use
the Orcad libraries only as a source; *all* parts exist in my
specialty library. When I add a part, I first look it up in the
libraries that came with Orcad, then modify the part to change
the power pins to passives. That makes them visible, and I clean
up any details I don't like about the part and save it. Then I
open my specialty library and insert the part from the saved
temporary copy. This insulates me from library changes later on,
too, since I never directly reference the distribution set.
>
>While on the subject of OrCAD docs, let me say that I've found
>them absolutely atrocious. They're complete, and they're
>accurate; but man what a chore it is to find what you're looking
>for in them! I got the impression the people writing the manuals
>didn't have a very good feel for how people look up information
>when they need it: seems like every time I try to find some
>Global Cosmic Universal Principle I end up having to slowly leaf
>through the manual page by page, until I finally find what I'm
>after buried in some parenthetical note way back on page 487.
>
>What are the Tango docs like? Mentor's documentation is very
>thorough, but it's all on-line and I'm NOT a fan of on-line
>documentation. I prefer books.
It's worse than Orcad's. Lots of repeated documentation on how
to point-and-click. Not much meat. It was probably written by a
contract writer who cut-and-pasted a lot of the text over and
over. Very unimpressive. Orcad's docs weren't so great, but at
least it was all in there. Somewhere.
Thomas Marti
it functions problemless
by Thomas
## CrossPoint v3.02 ##
Joseph H Allen
>>But isn't there a similar problem in OrCAD with the invisible
>>placing dummy power objects on the sheet [.....] Now that I know
>>difficulty; but it was a real bear figuring it out the first
>>time. But am I ignoring an easier workaround?
>Nope, that's one way I've done it too. In Tango you can fish
>around in the Pin Attributes window and change the net connection
>on a chip. They're still hidden, just like Orcad. What I do in
>real life is to always pull my parts from *my* library.
Each design I make has its own library. This is really essential if you
plan on giving the design to someone else. Also it prevents you from
ruining old designs in case you decide to modify a part. I wish orcad made
this a little easier though. Also I wish you could create new parts while
in OrCAD. Does the 386 version allow this? I have the 286 version.
--
/* jha...@world.std.com (192.74.137.5) */ /* Joseph H. Allen */
int a[1817];main(z,p,q,r){for(p=80;q+p-80;p-=2*a[p])for(z=9;z--;)q=3&(r=time(0)
+r*57)/7,q=q?q-1?q-2?1-p%79?-1:0:p%79-77?1:0:p<1659?79:0:p>158?-79:0,q?!a[p+q*2
]?a[p+=a[p+=q]=q]=q:0:0;for(;q++-1817;)printf(q%79?"%c":"%c\n"," #"[!a[q-1]]);}
Svenn Are Bjerkem
>for...@peak.org (Mark G. Forbes) wrote:
>
>[re Tango Pro complexity v. OrCAD]
>>use the Windows Recorder utility, and it mostly works, sometimes."
>>A real confidence-builder.
Nice, I've always wondered what the hell to use that feature
for... :-)
>
>products or even to shareware. CAD vendors sometimes seem to
>think nothing about advertising a feature and then leaving it to
>the buyer to figure out, too late, that the feature doesn't work
>right.
And most of them are paranoid too. How many different locking
systems
haven't been invented by CAD vendors? I use some cracked versions
in my
noncommersial spare time (I am a student) without any regrets. I
have
learnt a lot of different CADs and I know which features I want,
and which
I find useless. Demo versions are _always_ no good.
>
>I agree that OrCAD's macro features are VERY nice. I use them
>all the time- a few mouse clicks and a few keystrokes, and you've
>got a brand-new macro that makes the job at hand a lot easier.
>It's so easy to create them I don't even really think about it
>while I'm doing it.
The macro feature in OrCAD is the best I have encountered so far.
The problem is the messy menu system and a low flexibility with
libraries, specially when more than one user is going to use the
same machine for designing. (seems like every EE has his own way
of doing things)
>
>>It's particularly apparent when doing things like adding component
>>attributes...internal part numbers and such. With Tango it's tedious,
>>with Orcad it's quick and easy.
>The Mentor DA's component "properties" are equivalent to OrCAD's
>"part fields" and are just as easy to add or modify; but you have
>to be EXTREMELY careful not to screw around with any of the
>pre-defined properties because you can totally garf up board
>layout or simulation or both and end up with a titanic mess.
I find the menu system on Mentor more like hiking without map and
compass :-)
>TTL devices, I end up with VCC and GND nets in the netlist; if I
>add CMOS devices I get VDD and VSS, which are separate from VCC
>and GND. If I add a CD4051 analog mux, I get VDD, VSS, and VEE.
>
>I've been working around this by placing dummy power objects on
>the sheet, one for each default-named power pin on the devices
I don't think there is an alternative. You can always edit the
libraries, but then again you are one of those EE's with his own
opinion. I find that Power names in OrCAD libraries match power
names in databooks, and why not? There's a convention on VCC and
GND for transistor circuitry as well as VDD and VSS for CMOS and
bipolar CMOS have VEE. Thats good.
>
>Now that I know how to handle the problem, it's certainly no big
>difficulty; but it was a real bear figuring it out the first
>time. But am I ignoring an easier workaround?
Nope.
>
>While on the subject of OrCAD docs, let me say that I've found
>them absolutely atrocious. They're complete, and they're
>accurate; but man what a chore it is to find what you're looking
>for in them! I got the impression the people writing the manuals
What about me who haven't had the manual? I've dechiffered most
of the user interface using experience from other CADs and a lot
of time. Eventually I got to peek in the OrCAD 386+ books but by
then I knew how to use draft and most of PCBII
PCB II is _the_ worst PCB program. Anybody tried to edit the
library of modules? Anyone who knows how to draw circles? like
round capacitors? (This is PCBII) I like the autorouter (because
its the only autorouter I've got which is usable) I really don't
think the vendors of OrCAD should be proud of what they've made.
I can understand why they use dongles: If too many EE p=E5eople
learn the bad quality to know, mobody would want to buy it. I
hope I step on a few toe here..........
>
>What are the Tango docs like? Mentor's documentation is very
>thorough, but it's all on-line and I'm NOT a fan of on-line
>documentation. I prefer books.
Agree. On our CAD lab there's an entire wall with Mentor manuals
and Synopsis manuals. I've tried to find some user guides, but
all there is is the command line interface to the diffferent
packages we've got. There's nothing sounding like: How to use DA
or On the fly with BoardStation..... When a program is so big
that the online manual is on CD-ROM, somebody should shout a
warning....
Why isn't there a world wide project on a Schematic capture and
board route for XFree86 (or X11) ? Just look at Linux, the
operating system. Linus Torvalds started something which really
has taken off. There's a lot of EE students with good programming
capabilities around the world, and there's a lot of experienced
EE's who can contribute with advice and testing. I find that my
486 DX25 got a new life with Linux. It's fast, it's multiuser and
it's free (I would of course donate to the Linux fund if I use
Linux in money making business...) I know there's a pcb package
out there, but no schematics, and my screen is too small to run
it.
Sigh, so many ideas and so few lifes.... :-)
>
>>--
>>for...@peak.org
>>Mark G. Forbes
>>"I am the person my parents warned me about."
>
>Dave Dilatush
>
>
--
Svenn Are Bjerkem
Andrew Mahon
Can anybody comment on their experiences with Protel's Advanced Schematic and
PCB layout (latest win versions). Which of the three would you prefer? Why?
I have found Protel's Adv. Sch. a bit frustrating in its layout, it requires
too many key strokes or clicks for common actions and its manuals poor for a
new user. On the other hand, its schematics look good, its ability to
cut/paste to/from other windows applications is great for documentation and
the size of the installed base gives a level of confidence that maybe the
problems will be sorted out (wishful thinking though).
Thanks -AM
HudsonRD
I chose Orcad as the "standard" since I'm more interested in
standardization than performance.
--
<! From: Roger D. Hudson, Sr. Systems Engineer, >
<! With: Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC) >
<! email address: Huds...@Eglin.AF.Mil >
Craig Jackson
I have used Protel schematic and PCB, both DOS versions and Windoze
versions for several years.
I can only cxompare these products with Orcad and Viewlogic, as I
haven't met Tango Pro.
In use, I find Protel much quicker than Orcad, but will admit that
Protel is somewhat more buggy. The Windoze versions are superb, in
that you can simultaneously run Protel Schematic and Advanced PCB
(and library manager for that matter) and simply ALT-TAB between
them.
Protel has a much easier interface than Orcad, and is much more
intuitive to use, being a typical Windows product. In addition,
however, most of the functions can still be accessed through quick
single letter keyboard actions.
I have had really good customer support from Protel.
Finally, Protel is approximately 50 percent of the cost of Orcad.
Admittedly, it doesn't have some of the neat features of Orcad, but
it is easy to use, offers great context switching, and is perfectly
adequate for all but the most complex, unwieldy boards.
My vote to Protel.
Cheers,
Craig Jackson,
Technical Officer,
Orroral Geodetic Observatory.
Ian Cull
cjac...@auslig.gov.au "Craig Jackson" writes:
> and...@compusult.nf.ca (Andrew Mahon) wrote:
> >
> > Just to make this a little more complicated....
> >
> > Can anybody comment on their experiences with Protel's Advanced Schematic
> Protel is somewhat more buggy.
in the end - but I think it is "the best of a bad bunch". None of the packages
we tried *really* behave like Windows programs.
Protel in particular seems to take no notice of the PC setup - it appears to
assume every PC is as good as the ?one? they tested it on. If you have plain
640x480 VGA, dialog boxes too big for the screen are used - how do you click
on a command button that is off the screen?
> I have had really good customer support from Protel.
Most of Protels response to our (many) faults with the first Windows version
were along the lines of "we can't duplicate this - must be your system". It
might be true (certainly trying to get a decent plotter driver is very hard)
but their program was the only one giving so many problems - maybe is it
more 'sensitive' than most.
> Finally, Protel is approximately 50 percent of the cost of Orcad.
Yes, this is a good deciding factor.
Are you *sure* you need Windows - most DOS versions have been around much
longer and are faster, less buggy, etc :)
--
Ian Cull, Gateshead
Stan Eker
: While on the subject of OrCAD docs, let me say that I've found
: them absolutely atrocious. They're complete, and they're
: accurate; but man what a chore it is to find what you're looking
: for in them! I got the impression the people writing the manuals
: didn't have a very good feel for how people look up information
: when they need it: seems like every time I try to find some
: Global Cosmic Universal Principle I end up having to slowly leaf
: through the manual page by page, until I finally find what I'm
: after buried in some parenthetical note way back on page 487.
If you want to see miserable documentation, try Protel. I'd take an old
OrCad manual, any day. Also, the schematic `drag' in Protel is so annoying
that we don't use it. They should *really* get a copy of OrCad to see how
it's done. The ONLY feature I like is the relative ease of making new
schematic and PCB parts. OrCad always sucked, but Protel is OK.
For general speed, I can whomp up a schematic in OrCad about twice as fast
as I can under Protel, with about 10X fewer button clicks.
Protel's on-line Windoze help is, if possible, even LESS useful than their
books are. It WON'T search the helpfile text for a matching string, so you
have to know *exactly* what they've mis-named a feature. Thanks a lot.
Tony Goodloe
>
>Just to make this a little more complicated....
>
>PCB layout (latest win versions). Which of the three would you prefer? Why?
>
>I have found Protel's Adv. Sch. a bit frustrating in its layout, it requires
>too many key strokes or clicks for common actions and its manuals poor for a
>new user. On the other hand, its schematics look good, its ability to
>cut/paste to/from other windows applications is great for documentation and
>the size of the installed base gives a level of confidence that maybe the
>problems will be sorted out (wishful thinking though).
>
>Thanks -AM
I have used OrCAD and Protel schematic capture extensively.
I switched from OrCAD to Protel to get a windows application. It was
a big mistake. Protel was chock full of bugs. As you mention, the docs
are poor also. I am at a new job and using OrCAD once again and am
pleased. The windows version of OrCAD has been announced. We'll see when
it is really here though. I have used OrCAD PCB and Tango Pro PCB and
OrCAD product was awful and have been very satisfied with the Tango.
The Tango product is a DOS app, not the windows version.
tony
Ran Talbott
>I have also tried to get the protel 2.0 demo, but the files on leonardo (the
>bwcc.dl$ file) was corrupt both in the zip and unzip directory.
That might be the bwcc.dll (Borland Windoze Custom Controls) library.
It's a "distributable" file, so anyone who owns a Borland compiler
can give you a copy without infringing. And, although it's not part
of the license, I doubt Borland would complain if a Quattro owner
gave you a copy, since it doesn't have any commercial value except
in support of Borland products and software developed with Borland
tools.
Ran
Dave Dilatush
>I have used OrCAD PCB and Tango Pro PCB and
>OrCAD product was awful and have been very satisfied with the Tango.
>The Tango product is a DOS app, not the windows version.
As much as I like OrCAD for schematic capture I'd have to agree
with you: I tried OrCAD PCB and was massively underwhelmed.
CD C:\...\PCB
DEL *.*
...and that's the way it went. Useless, in my opinion.
Dave Dilatush
Daune Smith
>From: ddi...@ix.netcom.com (Dave Dilatush)
>Subject: Re: Orcad -vs- Tango Pro? -vs- Protel?
>Date: Thu, 08 Jun 1995 22:03:41 GMT