exxos blog - random goings on

[exxos]

If you use those smaller BQ buffer packages we were discussing the other day you could stager the DIPs and make it slimmer similar to the H4 buffer board.

Don't even remember you doing that board :( though JLC don't do any smaller packages than that SOIC one :(.. So I don't think your layout would really be smaller overall..

[Icky]

@exxos - just realised those smaller packages are 3v3 so they are of no use here :)

[exxos]

DMA mod board done. This has to be used in addition to the 1772 mod board. I forgot to add the resistors on the 1772 board :roll: So just added those on.

Both these boards combine together to create the "ULTRA DMA FIX" board. These are based on all the known DMA fixes to date.

I plotted this to fit on a standard STFM 70789 type.. Should work on all ST's, but with so many different motherboard layouts etc.. Not really looking into producing any other variants the different motherboards.

DMA_FIX.PNG

1772_fix.PNG

[exxos]

I have also started a 4MB RAM foot upgrade variation where the DRAM is on the shifter board.. This will allow a simple solder adapter for surface mounted MMU's...

I have almost completed the shifter board, the MMU adapter board will take a little more time because pin spacing has to be very accurately done.

Capture.PNG

[exxos]

After looking at some kicad videos I thought I would give it another try...

Amazingly it imported the H5 and at a glance it looks correct, we did moan about one of the Tstop layers being unsupported but that is not a huge issue..

One of his features seems to centralise the view when you zoom in and out.. I can see why this would be a really useful feature.. From me coming from Eagle where it does not do that, it actually irritated me a lot, but thankfully you can turn that off!

I ripped up a track and rerouted it, it seems you have to define your own track widths whereas they are generally preset in eagle, but that is not a huge thing anyway. Once your favourite track widths are set I would imagine they would be there in the drop-down list all the time from then on anyway.

One of the most annoying things about Eagle is it completely ignores "obstacles" a lot of the time which is generally why I ended up with so many shorted wires and all sorts of odd things wrong with PCBs :roll: But I did a video quickly just to demonstrate that it actually walked around because automatically while moving tracks! that is a brilliant feature to have!





I have not yet worked out how to turn on the poly fill :lol: :roll:


EDIT:

ah there we go..

Capture.PNG

This is like 1,000x faster than eagle! Eagle will take several seconds to update the screen was such a large board :roll: KiCad is ultrafast!

[stephen_usher]

I have for some time wondered why you hadn't made the jump.

You may like to look at how to use the external Freerouting program if you want to do auto-routing. It does a decent job most of the time, though can get itself stuck sometimes.

[exxos]

I have for some time wondered why you hadn't made the jump.

I had tried it previously some years ago and it was pretty terrible.. But as I have been using Eagle for like 30 years is not so easy just to jump to another program.

You may like to look at how to use the external Freerouting program if you want to do auto-routing. It does a decent job most of the time, though can get itself stuck sometimes.

Last time I checked that program was broken / obsolete or not supported or something any more.

[exxos]

oh cool PCB render...

Capture.PNG

EDIT:

Pretty cool that dragging a track automatically moves other ones as well...

[stephen_usher]

[Last time I checked that program was broken / obsolete or not supported or something any more.

Well, I downloaded it about a year ago and used it recently with an updated version. It's not at all integrated in KiCAD. You have to export a Spectra file, run Freerouting and then import the Spectra Session. (Remembering to back-up your KiCAD files before hand in case you want to revert to the pre-routed version.)

[derkom]

Pretty cool that dragging a track automatically moves other ones as well...

Yup. The KiCad push-and-shove router is great. I've never done anything complicated like the H5 of course, but for the little things I've done, pushing the wires all around is pretty fun.

I notice you're using the menu every time you want to drag a wire. I don't know if perhaps that is preferable because of your RSI, but do note that you can get into the same mode by pointing at the wire and pressing the D key. That's a big time saver if you're doing a lot of dragging around.

For me, what I have typically done is connected all the points I want connected, with only very rough regard to where my wires are going, and then use the drag function to get everything tidied up. This works a lot better than trying to route things perfectly by hand during the initial laydown.

Oh, and I know I have linked this before in at least one other thread about KiCad, but this YouTube tutorial series is really good.