New 16.5 user 

Hi all,

 I am new to PCB Editor 16.5 coming from Orcad Layout 15.7. I have been using Orcad products to do pcb layouts since it first came out back in the 80's. I would consider myself an expert user in Orcad Layout. I have found the transition to 16.5 to be nothing short of painful and I am looking for some guidance to help ease the pain..........

Any tips / lessons learned from folks that have successfully made this jump would be appreciated.

Tom

There is a great book avaliable written by Kraig Mitzner - Complete PCB Design using Orcad Capture and PCB Editor. Although it written for version 16.0 the basics are the same. I would also recommend talking to either Cadence or the VAR that sold you the software. Most VAR's have excellent resources, PDF's, videos, tutorials, training that help users make the switch.

If you have specific questions then you've found the correct forum to ask. Good luck.

Thanks for the response Steve.

I do have Mitzners book and it does cover a lot of things, but............ For example, I started out making a simple 16 pin footprint for practice. Accidentally made it 17 pins. Could not figure out how to delete pin 17. Spent at least one hour on it, book was no help as well as online resources. Ended up opening a trouble ticket (boy did I feel stupid doing that) and found how to do it. Frustrating in that in 15.7 I could just hit the delete key or open up a the footprints spread sheet and delete it there. In 16.5 I have to set filters, pick edit then delete and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I have to figure out the correct sequence. So what used to be one or two clicks or key presses is now at least doubled. That is one of the things I'm finding is that there are a lot more clicks involved in doing things now.

 I'll be sure to try here first with specific questions.

Tom

 PS: I also miss the backspace command to turn the layers off, plus "i", "o", "c" for zooming and a simple "v" for via............

Steve,

Is it true that I can download 15.7 and use that to maintain legacy designs while moving forward with new designs in 16.5?

Tom

Found out you can only run 16.2 and 16.5. But 16.2 will allow me to edit / maintain .max files which is what I was looking for.

Tom

Trying to set up user defined function keys. App note referenced above says to edit the env file located in the %home% directory. I have no such file in the pcbenv directory. I have "allegro.geo"; "allegro.ini: and "allegro.mru". That's it, no "env" file.

Am I looking in the wrong place? Did a general search for a file called env and nothing turned up.

 Tom

The env file is written when you make a change to the User Preferences. If you haven't done this go to Setup - User Preferences then just click apply. This writes the env file to the %HOME\pcbenv folder. You can then edit in a text editor.

Thanks Steve. Worked like a charm. I can now zoom in and out using i and o.

Do you know if there is a list of commands or the syntax for the command that I can use when assigning keys?

 Tom

You can either use Tools - Utilities - Keyboard commands - which lists ALL commands but I think a better way is to type scriptmode +e at the command line, this then sets PCB Editor so anytime you do anything (like Edit - Move) you would see the actual command name at the command line. This example would display CMD> move. This is the bit you need for the alias. Scriptmode is only active for this session. If you close PCB Editor down you would have to type it again to see the commands.

When routing in OrCad PCB Designer and I want to jump onto another layer I must either right click and select a layer from the "Change Alternate Layer" or select the new layer from the options menu. I was curious if anyone knew if I could create a function key in ENV FILE? (C:\SPB_Data\pcbenv))

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After reading your posts I was able to get this command from the command window. (pop dyn_option_select 'Change Alternate Layer@:@INNER2')

Funckey l pop dyn_option_select 'Change Alternate Layer@:@INNER2' 

When I apply it to the ENV File and reload PCB Editor. Nothing happens when I am routing a new trace.

Am I doing something wrong?

Also is there a command that would allow me to cycle through all my "Alternate layers"?  

Thanks

Jason 

Your better off using the working layer option. Take a look at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzEWtlLJARk