Zones are used to create power planes (also known as ground planes, though strictly speaking that refers specifically to a conductive plane at ground potential). If designed correctly they will reduce electromagnetic emissions from your board and reduce its susceptibility to electromagnetic fields. Typically on a two layer board you have one plane for ground on one side, and one on the other side for V+ (as that makes the most efficient use of the available area), but of course you may have more than one supply voltage (possibly both positive and negative), in which case having multiple supply voltage zones may be helpful. Note that the supply voltage planes *do* need to be electrically connected to the ground plane at all non-zero frequencies in order to be useful (typically that is achieved with the liberal application of decoupling capacitors).
Multi-layer boards allow you to reduce the size of the holes in your power planes (which is a good thing), but I'm guessing you will be creating two layer boards. Before designing your board I do recommend that you do a bit of research first to learn what makes a good power plane and what will give the board more EMC problems than having no planes at all. Fortunately it's not hard stuff to learn (unless you want to go into the theory). Regards, Robert [email protected] wrote: > Ive read the help Docs in PCBnew on zones,but i still don't get > what they are used for. > Are they just for placing v+ and gnd ? > Couldn't I just place vias or pins for v+ and gnd? > Should i just make 2 polygons, one for v+ and one for gnd? > > > > > > ------------------------------------ > > Please read the Kicad FAQ in the group files section before posting your > question. > Please post your bug reports here. They will be picked up by the creator of > Kicad. > Please visit http://www.kicadlib.org for details of how to contribute your > symbols/modules to the kicad library. > For building Kicad from source and other development questions visit the > kicad-devel group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/kicad-develYahoo! Groups > Links > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > > No virus found in this incoming message. > Checked by AVG - www.avg.com > Version: 8.5.375 / Virus Database: 270.13.3/2216 - Release Date: 07/03/09 > 05:53:00 >
No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 8.5.375 / Virus Database: 270.13.3/2217 - Release Date: 07/03/09 18:11:00
