Hello All,

My company currently uses Altium's PCAD 2004 and are considering
switching to Altium Protel 2004.

For the people using Protel, how do you like it?

Are there any "quirks" that I should know about using Protel?

In general I've heard good things about Protel. There will be some
growing pains, but switching to any other CAD would have similar
issues.

Thanks,

Eric

On 30 Aug 2005 07:52:25 -0700, Eric wrote:

> Hello All,
> 
> My company currently uses Altium's PCAD 2004 and are considering
> switching to Altium Protel 2004.
> 
> For the people using Protel, how do you like it?
> 
> Are there any "quirks" that I should know about using Protel?

Most of the complaints you will hear from Protel users will be directed at
Altium's business policies - focusing on attracting new users with feature
bloat rather than fixing long standing bugs, indifference to existing
customers' needs etc. - but since you are already an Altium customer this
shouldn't shock you.

> 
> In general I've heard good things about Protel. There will be some
> growing pains, but switching to any other CAD would have similar
> issues.

Indeed.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Eric

Bob Stephens wrote:

> On 30 Aug 2005 07:52:25 -0700, Eric wrote:
> 
> 
>>Hello All,
>>
>>My company currently uses Altium's PCAD 2004 and are considering
>>switching to Altium Protel 2004.
>>
>>For the people using Protel, how do you like it?
>>
>>Are there any "quirks" that I should know about using Protel?
> 
> 
> Most of the complaints you will hear from Protel users will be directed at
> Altium's business policies - focusing on attracting new users with feature
> bloat rather than fixing long standing bugs, indifference to existing
> customers' needs etc. - but since you are already an Altium customer this
> shouldn't shock you.

<curmudgeon>

And how is that different than PCAD 2004?

</curmudgeon>

Eric wrote:
> Hello All,
>
> My company currently uses Altium's PCAD 2004 and are considering
> switching to Altium Protel 2004.
>
> For the people using Protel, how do you like it?
>

We use the Altium DXP (which is the latest version of the Protel
software) schematic package at work. It is the worst schematic package
I have ever used. It is buggy and has a lousy user interface. I have
used many schematic packages over that past years and I am constantly
amazed at how Altium can make the simplest things so complicated.

 - Simple features like dragging sections of schematic never works
properly. It insists on adding connections between wires that weren't
there before.

- Clicking on Undo after a drag and drop causes the program to crash

- The Help files are useless. It has never had any help information on
anything I have tried to look up.

- There is no easy way to specify that you want to have seperate ground
planes that connect a single point.

- The print function is hopelessly complicated (There are 3 different
Print Menu fuctions and settings from one conflict with settings from
others).

The list of problems goes on and on....

I think that DXP is an overpriced, underperforming piece of software. I
think that the programmers who wrote it should be sentenced to a year
of doing 'real' designs with it for an electrical engineer and then see
how they like it.

Other than that, I think it sucks.

On 1 Sep 2005 07:41:27 -0700, g...@xoxy.net wrote:

> I think that DXP is an overpriced, underperforming piece of software. I
> think that the programmers who wrote it should be sentenced to a year
> of doing 'real' designs with it for an electrical engineer and then see
> how they like it.
> 
> Other than that, I think it sucks.

Well don't sugarcoat it. Tell us how you *really* feel ;)

I agree with all of the points you raise, but what is the alternative?


Bob

On Thu, 1 Sep 2005 09:21:42 -0700, Bob Stephens <r...@dcxchol.com>
wrote:

>On 1 Sep 2005 07:41:27 -0700, g...@xoxy.net wrote:
>
>> I think that DXP is an overpriced, underperforming piece of software. I
>> think that the programmers who wrote it should be sentenced to a year
>> of doing 'real' designs with it for an electrical engineer and then see
>> how they like it.
>> 
>> Other than that, I think it sucks.
>
>Well don't sugarcoat it. Tell us how you *really* feel ;)
>
>I agree with all of the points you raise, but what is the alternative?
>

I also agree with what you say. The programmers at Altium seem to play
with different programming paradigms. It is extremely clear that the
people who write the software has never used the program to do
a real world design. They seem to have spent an amazing amount of
time adding all sort of functionality that nobody uses. Who uses
Protel DXP for EPLD/FPGA design ? I think the first company that
comes up with a viable alternative, and goes back to the core business
of writing usable software for designing of schematics and laying out
of PCBs, will have many takers.

Regards
  Anton Erasmus

On 30 Aug 2005 07:52:25 -0700, in comp.arch.embedded "Eric"
<e...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>Hello All,
>
>My company currently uses Altium's PCAD 2004 and are considering
>switching to Altium Protel 2004.
>
>For the people using Protel, how do you like it?
>
>Are there any "quirks" that I should know about using Protel?
>
>In general I've heard good things about Protel. There will be some
>growing pains, but switching to any other CAD would have similar
>issues.
>
>Thanks,
>
>Eric
I'm still with 9 year old Accel Tango, which is still adequate for me.
Altium used to send the occasional demo CD last being  2004, which
wouldnt run on one computer.

Don't they do a demo CD of Protel?

The thing I would worry about is changing all my libraries,
footprints and the facility to import designs from the previous CAD
package


martin

Thanks all for your comments and opinions.

So nobody has anything good to say about Protel?

We have a corporate mandate to have all engineering divisions on the
same CAD package and Protel is the prefered choice at the moment.

The FPGA editor looks interesting, but I'm not sure if I want to trade
my good old ISE GUI.

Thanks again,
Eric

On Thu, 01 Sep 2005 20:32:21 +0200, martin griffith
<m...@XXyahoo.co.uk> wrote:

>On 30 Aug 2005 07:52:25 -0700, in comp.arch.embedded "Eric"
><e...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>>Hello All,
>>
>>My company currently uses Altium's PCAD 2004 and are considering
>>switching to Altium Protel 2004.
>>
>>For the people using Protel, how do you like it?
>>
>>Are there any "quirks" that I should know about using Protel?
>>
>>In general I've heard good things about Protel. There will be some
>>growing pains, but switching to any other CAD would have similar
>>issues.
>>
>>Thanks,
>>
>>Eric
>I'm still with 9 year old Accel Tango, which is still adequate for me.
>Altium used to send the occasional demo CD last being  2004, which
>wouldnt run on one computer.
>
>Don't they do a demo CD of Protel?
>
>The thing I would worry about is changing all my libraries,
>footprints and the facility to import designs from the previous CAD
>package

The older Protel Packages could import files from Tango. This
functionality has been thrown out since Protel 98. The router
of Protel DXP is still not on par with an old version of Specctra 
Router, that I am still using. There was a period about 10 years
ago, where the new versions of the PCB cad packages made
greate improvements on the previous versions. The last 5 years,
they seem to have been going backwards. The packages need
much faster machines, but in actual functionality nothing has been
gained.

Regards
  Anton Erasmus

Eric wrote:
> Thanks all for your comments and opinions.
> 
> So nobody has anything good to say about Protel?
> 
> We have a corporate mandate to have all engineering divisions on the
> same CAD package and Protel is the prefered choice at the moment.

  That made some sense in the past, but these days moving between
CAD systems is getting easier.

  You could show them the info at

http://www.mentor.com/products/pcb/pads/translators.cfm

-jg