--- In [email protected], Greg Dyess <gregory.dy...@...> wrote: >
> While we're on the topic of external, auto-routers, has anyone seen this one: > http://www.wand.net.nz/~amb33/toporouter/ > It appears to use some "new"(??) methodology called "Rubberband based > topological routing" instead of the traditional "geometric sequential maze > routing". Something I noticed was that it created flowing traces as opposed > to traces with hard corners. It appears to have been developed to work > primarily with PCB. Has anyone used this or knows how well it actually works? > Topo-R has been around a long time. The version for Windows is nice, but you need to look at the tutorial to understand it. Topo-R Lite has limitations on nets, but they still give you access for many designs. I've tested it in single and dual layer routing, and it seems to work very well. I did find that one time a trace was overlapping, but it was easy to revise manually. It has DRC, teardrops, keepouts, pours, and many other nice features. TOPO-R CANNOT CREATE A SESSION FILE THAT CAN BE RE_IMPORTED to PCBNew. At least I've never been able to move a layout back into KiCAD/PCBNew. KiCAD throws an error when opening the .ses. The good news is Topo-R has built-in gerber and drill file output capability. You can generate what you need for the board-house after the routing is done. --CG
