Altium Designer tutorial is the fast and efficient tool to make PCB designs. This tool is another name of the engineering art. It connects an exhaustive scientific knowledge having some original design. It is an Electronic style Automation and Native 3D PCB Style system software package.
Contents.History MicroCode CircuitMaker CircuitMaker, TraxMaker and SimCode were originally developed by the -based MicroCode Engineering, Inc. CircuitMaker 5 for, and became available in 1997, CircuitMaker 6, CircuitMaker PRO, TraxMaker 3 and TraxMaker PRO in 1998. Protel CircuitMaker (EDA) developer Protel marketed CircuitMaker 2000 as a tool, together with TraxMaker as its counterpart, as a powerful yet affordable solution for circuit board needs. Its ease of use and comparatively low cost quickly gained it popularity among students, and the software suite was commonly used to teach circuit board design to engineering students in universities. The wide availability of plug-ins and component libraries have accelerated adoption, and quickly amassed a worldwide community. When Protel was renamed Altium Limited in the early 2000s, engineering efforts were redirected towards the development of, and CircuitMaker 2000 was eventually discontinued.
![Altium Designer Hobbyist Altium Designer Hobbyist](/uploads/1/2/5/3/125363974/650839482.png)
Due to its new status as, CircuitMaker 2000 remained popular among hobby users and students. This popularity has been observed by Altium, and the most successful features of CircuitMaker 2000 have since been integrated in DXP 2004 and later were incorporated into.Altium CircuitMaker and easy-to-use such as the and the have increased community interest in electronics, particularly in,. The leading EDA software vendors traditionally lack free versions, and professional licenses are unaffordable for amateurs. This resulted in high rates for professional software packages, or users sticking to, including CircuitMaker 2000. Several initiatives such as have attempted to fill this void, releasing restricted versions of semi-professional EDA tools. The rise of further fragmented the market. This pressure eventually provided the incentive for Altium to release a simplified and more user friendly version of their professional EDA software package and, targeted at less complex circuit board projects.
This culminated into the rebirth of CircuitMaker as and software.Despite the resemblance in naming, the current CircuitMaker differs entirely from CircuitMaker 2000 regarding features and: the SPICE simulation module has been removed; the library system has been overhauled; and the controls changed from classic menus to a more modern and visually appealing.Merge with Upverter On 14 May 2018, Altium announced plans to merge CircuitMaker and into a single, free to use design platform. However, in a blog post on May 11, 2019, Altium Ted Pawela stated that the plans had evolved, and the products would remain separate, with interoperability features for the design files. Features CircuitMaker implements schematic capture and PCB design using the same engine as Altium Designer, providing an almost identical user experience. The schematic editor includes basic component placement and circuit design as well as advanced multi-channel design and hierarchical schematics.
All schematics are uploaded to the Altium server and can be viewed by anyone with a CircuitMaker account, stimulating design re-use. CircuitMaker supports integration with the search engine and allows drag and drop placement of components from the Octopart search results if schematic models are attached to them. Users can build missing schematic symbols and commit them to the server, called the Community Vault, making them available for other users.
The continuously growing part database eliminates the need for a custom schematic symbol or footprint design for common parts, increasing user-friendliness for beginners.Concurrency editing was added in version 1.3, allowing multiple users to collaborate on a schematic or PCB document simultaneously and exchange thoughts through an integrated comment and annotation system.Transfer of schematics to a PCB is a straightforward process in CircuitMaker since PCB footprints are automatically attached to any component on the schematic that was picked from the Octopart library. PCB footprints may have simple 3D models or complex attached to them, enabling real time 3D rendering of the PCB during development. CircuitMaker supports design rule configuration and real time design rule checking.
Some advanced features, including, interactive length tuning, and polygon pour management, are also available. Production files can be exported directly, although an external Gerber viewer must be used to check the exports.
The entire PCB can also be exported as a 3D STEP model for further use in mechanical 3D CAD software.Open source hardware CircuitMaker requires a free account to represent its users in the. An active is required to start and use the software. Users are allowed to have 2 private projects, the so-called mode for practicing. By default, all schematics and PCBs are uploaded to the server and can be viewed by other users as soon as they are committed through the internal engine.
While this renders CircuitMaker undesirable for projects, it encourages collaboration in the community. Users are allowed to existing projects, or request permission to collaborate in existing projects. Importing schematic documents and PCBs from other EDA packages (, ) is supported. Users are allowed to own unlimited projects, and there is no hard limit on board complexity. However, Altium warns that users may experience a performance drop for large projects.All documents are under by default, allowing users to revert changes made in their projects, and build new versions of existing schematic symbols or footprints in the Community Vault.
Users can comment on each other's projects and parts, rate them, and propose improvements.CircuitMaker supports direct generation of in industry standard formats such as and NC Drill, as well as for. Online community As of April 2017, there are over 110,000 registered users within the CircuitMaker Community, together authoring over 12 000 PCB projects. The ease of use has led to rapid adoption of CircuitMaker by schools and universities to teach PCB design. Criticism As a result of its reliance on the Altium Designer schematic capture and PCB design engine, CircuitMaker is only available for the.
This requires users to have access to a Windows to use CircuitMaker. Dependence on Windows has been cited as a weakness of the CircuitMaker project, and Altium had reported to current users that a solution is in development. As of 2019, CircuitMaker can be run in on, with limitations, but the installation procedure is cumbersome, and many users reported it does not work on their. This currently forces most users to fall back to a complete. Unofficial support for Linux and BSD users is provided by Altium staff and volunteers on the CircuitMaker forum. The effort to develop a cross platform desktop client seems to have been abandoned since the acquisition of Upverter.
CircuitMaker currently does not install or run on due to a related error.A second concern is the resulting from CircuitMaker's cloud centric approach. While users can import resources from competing EDA software packages, CircuitMaker does not support exporting design resources itself. Reviewers consider this in conflict with the open source ideology.
However, a workaround for this issue is provided by Altium Designer 15 and 16 which do support the import of CircuitMaker files. A trial version of Altium Designer can be requested free of charge from Altium for this purpose. The community has developed pathways to share schematic symbols and footprints between CircuitMaker, Altium Designer, and CircuitStudio despite the lack of official Altium support.See also.References. Graves, George (20 June 2015). Retrieved 24 November 2015. Cite web requires website=.
Fabio, Adam (24 September 2015). Retrieved 24 November 2015. Cite web requires website=. Retrieved 24 November 2015.
No, there is no licensing to worry about, and no subscription to maintain. The original version of CircuitMaker (latest edition was CircuitMaker200) always came with a free version targeted towards the educational market. The current version of CircuitMaker is totally free, giving you all the tools to think big and make cool stuff, with features and functionality to facilitate creation of diverse and challenging designs. Cite web requires website=. Retrieved 24 November 2015. Cite web requires website=.
3 November 1997. Cite web requires website=. 27 August 1998. Cite web requires website=. Arnold, Russell (9 January 1998), Electronic Products. (PDF), MicroCode Engineering Inc., 1998. (2000).
Star Printery Pty Ltd. (PDF) from the original on 2018-04-15. Retrieved 2018-04-15.
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Retrieved 23 April 2017. Cite web requires website=. Yan, Ni (2007). Practical Exercises of Protel DXP2004. PRC: Science Press.
Onwubolu, Godfrey (2005). Mechatronics: Principles and Applications. Elsevier Ltd. Pp. 637–640. Verbelen, Yannick; Van Belle, Davy; Tiete, Jelmer (2013). International Journal of Engineering Innovation & Research.
2 (2): 134–143. Retrieved 22 November 2015. Zak Homuth (2018-05-15). Cite web requires website=.
TedPawela, Author (11 May 2019). Retrieved 2019-07-17. Cite web requires website=.
Jordan, Ben (12 November 2015). Retrieved 24 November 2015. Cite web requires website=. Maxfield, Clive (28 October 2014). Retrieved 24 November 2015. Cite web requires website=. Verbelen, Yannick (4 January 2018).
CircuitMaker Blog. Retrieved 18 January 2019.
Cite web requires website=. Fijolek, Rafal (5 August 2016).
Retrieved 5 August 2016. Cite web requires website=.
Maxfield, Clive (28 October 2014). Retrieved 24 November 2015. Cite web requires website=. Jordan, Ben (9 October 2016). CircuitMaker Forum.
Retrieved 18 January 2019. Cite web requires website=. Jones, Dave (16 June 2015). Retrieved 24 November 2015. Cite web requires website=. Retrieved 24 November 2015.
To use CircuitMaker requires an account to be setup. This is achieved by registering to become part of the CircuitMaker Community - through the CircuitMaker website. Cite web requires website=. Jones, Dave (26 September 2013).
Retrieved 24 November 2015. It requires an internet connection to make the thing work. You cannot start the thing or otherwise work on your projects without an internet connection.
Cite web requires website=. Retrieved 24 November 2015. CircuitMaker is completely free, with zero limitations to hold back your design potential. Cite web requires website=. Retrieved 24 November 2015. While there are no 'hard limits' per se, the software has been engineered to make it impractical for use with large designs.
To this end, the PCB Editor will start to exibit sic performance degradation when editing designs containing 5000 pads, becoming virtually unusable with designs containing 50,000 pads. Degradation itself takes the form of progressive slow-down in PCB editing functions (such as routing, placing components, polygon pours, etc). Cite web requires website=. Verbelen, Yannick (7 April 2018). CircuitMaker Blog. Retrieved 18 January 2019. Cite web requires website=.
Jordan, Ben (11 October 2016). CircuitMaker Blog.
Retrieved 22 April 2017. (.) CircuitMaker has now surpassed the 100,000 registered users mark (.). Retrieved 16 April 2017. Rapptor Education (in Dutch). Retrieved 16 April 2017. Verbelen, Yannick (2016). (PDF) (in Dutch).
Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Pp. 37–52. Verbelen, Yannick (16 December 2017). CircuitMaker Blog. Retrieved 19 January 2019.
Cite web requires website=. Jones, Dave (26 September 2013). Retrieved 24 November 2015. Cite web requires website=.
Retrieved 24 November 2015. While we appreciate the passion of Linux users, Altium products are currently only Windows-based. We will investigate support for Linux in the future, but do not make any promises of implementation, or time line.
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In the meantime, you can run CircuitMaker by running Windows in a Virtual Machine on Linux. Cite web requires website=. Jordan, Ben (29 June 2016). CircuitMaker Blog.
Retrieved 15 April 2017. Fred, Jim (5 March 2017). Retrieved 15 April 2017. Anderson, James (23 August 2016).
CircuitMaker Forum. Retrieved 15 April 2017. Carlson, Jay (13 June 2015). CircuitMaker Forum. Retrieved 15 April 2017. Verbelen, Yannick (2 March 2017).
CircuitMaker Forum. Retrieved 16 April 2017. In VMware 12, using the latest version of the ReactOS alpha, CircuitMaker downloads and installs without the 'orange box' issue seen in WINE, but hangs forever when trying to install.NET Framework 4.0. CircuitMaker FAQ.
10 March 2016. Retrieved 15 April 2017. CircuitMaker's EAGLE Importer is able to import EAGLE design files saved with EAGLE version 6.4.0 (or later).
Loughhead, Phil (25 November 2015). CircuitMaker Forum. Retrieved 15 April 2017.
Importing into AD15 or AD16 is the only method of transferring a CircuitMaker PCB file to Altium Designer. Verbelen, Yannick (12 December 2017). CircuitMaker Blog. Retrieved 18 January 2019. Cite web requires website=. LaMothe, Andre (5 January 2019).
CircuitMaker Forum. Retrieved 18 January 2019. Cite web requires website= External links.