Re: P-CAD unsuitable for networks

From: Gary Crowell / VCP (vcp_at_cableone.net)
Date: 11/30/04 

Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 20:17:00 -0700

On Mon, 29 Nov 2004 13:51:48 -0600, Kenneth Porter
<shiva.blacklist@sewingwitch.com> wrote:

>I'm shopping for an inexpensive CAD system for a small startup doing
>microprocessor-based servo stuff. I need fine-line multilayer for the
>digital stuff, and copper pours and weird copper structures for analog
>work.
>
>I asked a buddy about P-CAD (what he uses) and he reports these serious
>deficiencies:
>
>> You can't save some things in pcad till all of the errors are gone. It
>> has been that way for a long time and the support people don't seem to
>> have much of a clue.

"Some things" are library components only, and it is possible to save
work-in-progress, and I often make 1500 pin FPGA components with no
problem.

>> It is a real pain if you are making a large library part you can't
>> stop and save and come back to it later. It also does not always tell
>> you that the file you just tried to save was to a read only directory
>> and it did not really do anything.

Never encountered that, but can't recall that I've tried.

>>It also trys to reconnect to all of
>> the files you have used recently so you can't move them.

Thats just the library files that it connects to, and there are simple
library and network management procedures that make this not a
problem.

>>same with
>> printers, if you remove a printer it has used recently you may not be
>> able to get it to run. or it will at least take quite a while to
>> startup....I have seen on the order of more than 10 minutes.
>

Never seen this and we have network printers all over the place,
changing all the time. This may have been an issue several years ago,
but is not with current version. PCAD2004 is "in the mail" and I'm
looking forward to it.

>This is of course unacceptable. I'm of the "save-early-save-often" school,
>because one can never predict acts of god that clobber one's work. I don't
>want to lose hours of work because of this kind of thing.

I've got over a dozen PCAD licenses, both networked floating, and node
licenses, and I manage the component library for a couple dozen users.
I don't have a problem with anything you describe. Sounds to me like
your buddy may be the problem.

Of course if you're looking for 'inexpensive', then you're probably
barking up the wrong cad system in the first place.

Gary Crowell
Micron Technology