On 12/14/2016 7:18 AM, volt-nuts-requ...@febo.com wrote:
Our company has been committed to Eagle for about 5 years.  The problem
you face is that your investment in IP (schematics, board layouts,
component libraries, etc) vastly out-values the software.  With a
proprietary system, you're either locked in or face huge costs in
converting.

Indeed.  I am just about to pull the trigger on KiCAD company-wide.  I
think it is ready for the kind of work we do (4 layer boards, some with
high current/voltage traces).  The only thing holding me back IS our
investment in IP.  Maybe with Eagle 7 using XML for data storage,
someone will write an Eagle to KiCAD converter.

I strongly recommend learning KiCAD (a fairly daunting task) before you
get any significant amount of IP committed to a proprietary format.



John makes some good points. The cost of not only IP, but even the time to learn the software add up significantly. Storing data in proprietary formats can lead to trouble later. (Eagle's proprietary format is a bit less proprietary now that it's .xml!)

KiCAD vs. Eagle vs. PCB Artist, Pads, vs. (fill in the blank) really depends on what you need. If it's a one off board, with a handful of components anything should work. You can always redraw it later in something else. If you have 500 components, differential signals, and controlled impedance stuff that's a different story.

Let us know what you end up doing.

Dan

_______________________________________________
volt-nuts mailing list -- volt-nuts@febo.com
To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/volt-nuts
and follow the instructions there.

Reply via email to