New CS videos - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: ahbushnell
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: November 30, 2017, 01:47:37 am
content: More videos on you tube for Circuit studio. I'm glad they are doing video's but they are very think on information.https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNw7Av7hr1lr1kT2J0Pm5OQAndy

author: slowertech
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: November 30, 2017, 02:51:55 am
content: Darn my suggestion did not make the cut.

author: ahbushnell
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: November 30, 2017, 03:34:54 am
content: What was your suggestion?

author: slowertech
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: November 30, 2017, 04:26:23 am
content: Comment about using cross select mode.https://www.element14.com/community/thread/62030/l/circuitstudio-support-how-to-videos-in-altium-circuitstudio

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 02, 2018, 01:07:18 pm
content: they are pathetic are providing instructions, I like the videos but they have waited so long to start doing them and only cover the basics which we have had to figure out, some videos o the finer points of the software would be nice.

author: voltsandjolts
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 03, 2018, 01:25:55 pm
content: Quote from: Simon on January 02, 2018, 01:07:18 pmThe online help documentation is generally very good. The videos are a nice extra, not a replacement.http://documentation.circuitstudio.com/display/CSTU/CircuitStudio+DocumentationIt still takes time and effort on your part to read documentation and learn new skills. And of course some patience.

author: Joel_l
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 03, 2018, 03:07:35 pm
content: I would say their online docs are poor. When I first started using CS, first few things I tried to look for were impossible to find. I ended up getting answers by asking questions in this forum. And then there is the ongoing issue of I want a downloadable COMPLETE real users manual that I can browse through offline. Downloading piece meal is not acceptable.

author: ahbushnell
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 03, 2018, 03:24:49 pm
content: Quote from: voltsandjolts on January 03, 2018, 01:25:55 pmThere are pages in the documentation that are blank.Hopefully they will continue to update.

author: taydin
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 03, 2018, 04:05:59 pm
content: I have been following the documentation page and the "howie" guy seems to be updating it. So things are improving.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 03, 2018, 08:49:46 pm
content: Yes they are making an effort, but some of it has been shoddy and their start at videos was a bit basic. One video sounded like it was sped up and the demonstration was so fast I found I hard to follow.

author: voltsandjolts
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 03, 2018, 09:36:58 pm
content: Quote from: Joel_l on January 03, 2018, 03:07:35 pmYou have been complaining about help docs being online only for some 8 months now (https://www.eevblog.com/forum/circuit-studio/downloadable-manual/) but I just don't get it.Personally, I need an internet connection when working on a project, for datasheets, supplier info, design tips... so up-to-date online docs work well in this context. No connection would be frustrating to say the least.Everyone has there own style I guess, but do you really need to refer to help docs much after using it for 8 months?As you have previously said, all the ECAD packages you have tried have annoyed you to some extent, even your favourite Allegro.Hopefully, now you have had time to use CS it annoys you less and there no showstopping features which prevent you completing your designs.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 10:58:33 am
content: A classic example is how do you define the standard for a pin? oh yea it just remembers the last settings you used IF you press TAB whilst placing a pin...... There are no specific default settings and they don't tell you anywhere......

author: voltsandjolts
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 11:28:06 am
content: The way it is seems intuitive to me.Setting a default parameters for a new pin would be near pointless anyway, there are many options I/O/IO/CLOCK/NEG... which you often need to select except for the most trivial of schematic symbols.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 12:42:39 pm
content: No things like text and the pin length are pretty standard for most. It only remembers the setting IF you press TAB whilst placing the pin to alter it, NOT if you change it's properties AFTER it is placed. The whole functionality hinges on one knowing to press TAB mid placement..... a very obvious thing I can discover by myself not. They mention the pressing of TAB in the "manual" but omit to say that any changes made here will be the new defaults and that this is the only way of setting up defaults. Like i say, crap documentation.

author: voltsandjolts
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 12:50:26 pm
content: CS is a sizable piece of software. If you actually expect hand-holding documentation detailed to that level then you are asking for a huge amount of documentation, 80% of which would never actually be used by anybody.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 12:54:41 pm
content: I think what we are talking about is basic functionality and it would take but one sentence to mention that: if you edit pin settings by pressing TAB during placement these will become the new defaults, I mean I just said it right? they have a huge long page that explains obvious GUI items but forget to explain about the functionality of a hot key, if hot keys are the only way of accessing options they need explaining. I can explore what is on the screen options wise, but things that rely on a hot key are a bit hard to find.....

author: voltsandjolts
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 01:49:21 pm
content: Well, this page does a reasonable job of explaining the TAB hotkey for pin editing, figure out the finer details yourself when using it:http://documentation.circuitstudio.com/display/CSTU/Sch_Obj-Pin((Pin))_CS...and since there are rather a lot of shortcut keys there is also a window to help you with that too:http://documentation.circuitstudio.com/display/CSTU/HelpAdvisor_Pnl-Shortcuts((Shortcuts))_CS

author: Joel_l
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 03:12:12 pm
content: I could use the online docs if I needed to while actively working on a project, that is if the online docs actually worked for me. One of my first cases was just wanting to highlight traces on a layout, searched for every thing I could think of, color trace, color track, highlight trace, highlight track.... not a single hit that was useful. Yes, I finally figured out how to do it in a cumbersome way ( which I later learned was the only way, ugh ) to do it. I had the same issue when I was trying to figure out how to do something with vias, numerous useless search hits. James chimed in with some suggestions but they did not help.For me, a complete doc is what I go through offline ( read, I would make a hard copy ) and learn about the nuances of the software. My preference while working on a project would be a good complete PDF that I can reference whether I'm online or not. As far as part specs.... I will have already gathered that information.Learning the basics of the software is not the issue, as you elude to, you can do that by just playing with software, it's the little details. And for me, I get those better thumbing through a real manual, I'm even happy to print it myself. The other consideration is if you use the software a lot or not, this is for casual use for me, so it takes longer for things to sink in.The reason I keep beating on this is it smells too much like paths I've been down before, company milks something along for as long as they can with minimal to no support. I'm still hoping this will not be the case. I left a company years ago that had a similar business model.Even EAGLE came with a printed manual when I bought it years ago.As you say, different folks like different things, I prefer printed manuals.Quote from: voltsandjolts on January 03, 2018, 09:36:58 pm

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 10:18:09 pm
content: As an example, the how to generate outputs video. The example shows how to produce gerber layers and the BOM, no mention of the NC drill files. guess what, I can export gerbers pretty easily but no one can figure out my drill files - CS always manage to tell us how to do the simple stuff but miss out the stuff that needs a little explaining......

author: ahbushnell
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 04, 2018, 10:35:43 pm
content: Quote from: Simon on January 04, 2018, 10:18:09 pmGo to projects and select Generate output.There will be a list of output files that you can configure. Select NC Drill Files and select ConfigureThe attached file shows the setup I just used to make a board and no problems.If you look on board vendors web site it will often list what they look for.Andy

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 05, 2018, 07:50:18 am
content: except 2 suppliers could not handle my gerbers, fortunately they could make sense of the ODB++ files. Why on earth make a video about gerbers and miss out the drills, they should have swapped the bom for the drill files. IF your going to make a video about gerbers you make sure you cover all of the files needed to be sent to a board manufacturer. A board manufacturer does not give a toss about your bom so why put that with gerbers instead of drill files ? they are completely and utterly incompetent!

author: voltsandjolts
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 05, 2018, 09:58:37 am
content: Simon, thank you for your moderating work on this forum, I appreciate that you are part of the team that keeps this excellent site up and running. That said, comments like thisQuote from: Simon on January 05, 2018, 07:50:18 amare at best good comedy and at worst sweeping generalisations that make you seem somewhat childish. Both this and the E14 forum have a few of these beauties from your good self.Sometimes you have a point and sometimes I see it as a lack of understanding on your part. Either way, please have a little more restraint and patience, I'd like to help you but comments like this reduce my motivation.IMHO ensuring you send drill and gerber data to your chosen manufacturer is a very basic check regardless of the ECAD software you are using and there is often a separate button for gerber and drill file creation.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 05, 2018, 10:07:47 am
content: Well I thought I had sent drill files several times, but no one could work them out. As I said if you are going to do a video about Gerber data then you should include drills, a full Gerber set with drill files goes to a board manufacturer, Gerber's and BOM won't really get you manufactured boards.Never mind of course that the default BOM template is actually the board stack template so you won't actually get a BOM until you play with the settings because some incompetent idiot set the defaults up wrong so every single user has to change it before they can use the software....

author: ahbushnell
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 06, 2018, 02:26:46 am
content: Quote from: Simon on January 05, 2018, 10:07:47 amLife is toughSent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: January 06, 2018, 10:02:17 am
content: There's no need to be sarcastic. It's not like this software was given to me for free. I made what is for me a significant investment into it before I had a chance to fully understand its capability because yes you get one month free trial but that is nothing when you are trying to try out such a complex piece of software on a part-time basis. This software used to cost £2500 and overnight dropped to £800. It was sold on the basis that you would get all that good stuff that people had come to love in Altium designer when in fact the software is quite buggy and when you get down to the point where your trying to produce a bill of materials it does not actually produce a bill of materials but instead produces a spreadsheet that lists the names of the layers is rather silly when all it would take is a bit of attention on their part in putting in a bill of material template as the default instead of the stack template as the default template for the bill of materials. How you can choose a layer stack template as a template for a bill of materials is just another hole in the software functionality. The two things are different but apparently you can throw any gibberish at it as a template.If you try and find the official support for circuit studio that is indeed the element 14 forum which unfortunately is in itself not the greatest piece of software as it's one of these new-age things instead of a proper forum system like the one we have here. So getting support there not the easiest thing and at the end of the day you can only but appeal to other people who are potentially just as clueless as you and seem to be locked into this religion where there was nothing wrong with the software anyway. I did come across a review which I didn't fully read and was written about the initial release of circuit studio and the guy did not sound impressed and as I keep saying said it was just simply full of bugs.The closest you get any decent support is one person that works for Farnell that is willing to look into potential bugs and he has in fact acknowledged that a couple of the things I have pointed out are indeed bugs that need looking into. He has also been most generous in giving me a few pointers here and there, but he is only one person.So we have a software made by one company and the support is offered by the company selling it in the form of the other potentially clueless users try to help each other with one person passing genuine bugs back to the manufacturer software. To add insult to injury the manual is not exactly as comprehensive as it could be and spends a lot of time pointing out the obvious. They then finally pull their fingers out of their arses and start making some videos which could be replaced by good written documentation but whatever floats their boat I'm certainly happy to look at a video as much as I am to read good documentation. But the videos also just cover basic things and do not go into the finer detail. So they are pretty pointless.If you would compare this to say Proteus you will see quite quickly that with Proteus you got for about 80% of the cost a software that was stable albeit awkward to use which is why I stopped using it and you could ring up during office hours and speak to somebody who understood the software and will try to help you although there documentation often was not brilliant either although they had a long-standing list of videos as well. So can't a multinational company compete on quality in the same way some little company based purely in England can. Yes on the whole circuit studio works well but it feels like it is more out of accident than design.edited to remove errors made in the speech recognition, another piece of not so brilliant software that 2 years later still can't interface properly with a web browser while the manufacturers claim there is no problem.....

author: ahbushnell
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: January 06, 2018, 04:18:26 pm
content: That was not nice of me.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 01, 2018, 02:13:43 pm
content: is it me or is the differential pair video second to useless ? the written documentation is also pants, I have to look at the altium documentation to give me an incline

author: ahbushnell
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 01, 2018, 02:16:20 pm
content: Quote from: Simon on February 01, 2018, 02:13:43 pmIt can be painful sometimes figuring this stuff out. But on the whole I like CS.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 01, 2018, 02:19:05 pm
content: on the whole I like it, I can't wait to get going, but no one wnts to tell me how it works! to top it all Altium want to offer my AD with a 30% discount for £4850, my response was that if I can take CS as a standard of their software they can stuff it! apparently they are now working on even more expensive software whilst still not seeing that you need to get people through the door in the first place!

author: Joel_l
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 01, 2018, 03:21:23 pm
content: I always found it humorous when Altium would call or email me trying to sell me an upgrade to designer. Let me see, I bought CS for <$500 with the potential or an on going $150 a year maintenance/ subscription fee. Why would there be any expectation that I would jump on 4-6K Designer plus $1800 a year subscription. It might happen for some, but I think Altium are very disconnected from reality.As I've mentioned before ( over and over ), I find CS tolerable, but it's a shame I have the sense it's just a sales tool for Altium and not being supported. I think I have about 60 days left now on my subscription, my plan is to let it go. I see no signs of life for this product from Altium at this point.

author: mars01
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: February 02, 2018, 12:02:38 pm
content: Joel, Altium have other priorities for now . Seems that Altium Designer 18 it's not quite finished yet and their efforts are focused there. They don't care so much about CS as they care for their flagship software.Since most likely the same team that works on AD is working on CS, it's no wonder that CircuitStudio is on standby.My guess is that they will try to release an update for CS just to fulfill an obligation but I will not expect something big.Just have a a few obvious bugs solved, might add some menu buttons for functions that are already there (callable through the search field). An 1.4.2 update.For me, it's not the first time that "I'm betting the wrong horse".I mean, this is not a "bad horse" but a "slow horse"For now, it's doing it's job and just that.

author: Joel_l
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 02, 2018, 02:16:42 pm
content: Telling any customer base they are less important is never a good move. Altium promised a rev 2.0 by the end of 2016, so it's not like CS has only been ignored for a short while. The little update that did happen last year does not count for much.Hopefully these are just your impressions ( unfortunately I agree with them and keep hoping I'm wrong ).

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 04, 2018, 05:51:30 pm
content: Unfortunately Altium are as thick as shit. The person I spoke to on the phone who was responding to me filling out their form which offers Altium at a low cost for new start-ups told me that they are busy working on an even more expensive product. I tried to explain to her that if only Altium would just do a lower version of designer they would be able to offer it at lower prices and bring people through the door. She acknowledged that this is what they needed to do and that it is what they do plan to do but in years to come because they are focusing their attention on this very expensive product which is going to be even bigger than a designer. So try to reiterate to her that no one is going to use it unless they get them earlier and younger with a cheaper version of Altium designer or a version of circuit studio that is not a poor advert for Altium.I suggested that she goes and finds days video if they want to know what is required but I'm sure they're not really interested. Clearly Altium is a company with multiple layers of management and the people at the top probably have no idea about the product they are selling. There probably people who just have product experience but no actual experience of electronics and electronics software.I'm still waiting for a callback from he who would become my account manager to discuss this super duper discounted Altium designer for small start-ups.Yes indeed the last update to circuit studio did absolutely nothing. It came very early on in me purchasing the product and am going to assume that it fixed a lot of the bugs that people were raving about in version 1. According to a chap at Farnell OU this year and update is due to be released which he told me when I complained about the lack of support for high resolution monitors. Perhaps that won't happen any more now that Altium top brass are interested in producing software that would cost tens of thousands of pounds which is great on paper until you find that nobody wants to buy your software because of the bad experience with your shitty and buggy cheap software.It doesn't matter how little you are charging a customer, a customer should always be treated with respect by the brand. If you are going to offer something so cheap that it will not meet expectations then don't offer it at all. This is my philosophy because I don't intend any of our customers to go away thinking that my products don't work when in actual fact I appeased them by giving them low prices. And this is how software houses should work as well.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 04, 2018, 06:39:45 pm
content: Well what I have had from them sofar is that if you are a company that is less than three years old they will give you a heavily discounted price for out in designer for up to 3 years. After three years you have to pay the full price or perhaps something close to the full price. The problem I have is that if I start creating no end of libraries and designs in Altium designer and my company does not take off to the point where I can afford software that cost £5000 what happens to all of my designs and libraries I have created. Do I effectively lose access to them? Would they working circuit studio?

author: jc101
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 12, 2018, 09:37:01 pm
content: Quote from: Simon on February 04, 2018, 06:39:45 pmThere is a StartUp scheme running, if your company is under 7 years old. Essentially you can get a Full AD licence for under £4k time limited to 3 years (inc maintenance for the 3 years in that price too), after that it just stops. You can then either buy an AD licence, or you could save everything in a format suitable for CS and go back to that. What is handy is it seems the price you paid for for the StartUp licence is fully credited against the cost of the AD licence. There is a 1 year version too for less than the annual AD sub.That doesn't seem bad for 3 years access to the full AD product, the aim I understand is that you have built up business enough to then move to the standard AD offering (perpetual licence and annual sub). The "risk" is that will CS be around in 3 years, and can you can export in such a way that CS can read the AD files - currently that is possible by saving in older formats within AD, but in the future... food for thought.

author: Simon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: February 12, 2018, 09:42:51 pm
content: Well they obviously can't be bothered to deal with me because I'm still waiting for the call. To be honest I'm totally unimpressed with Altium and I do not wish to spend any further money. I have had the product for nearly a year now and I'm still waiting for that next major update which hopefully will fix a lot of the bugs. As far as I am concerned they should be given the same attention to every software they produce and therefore I take the quality of circuit studio is a representation of the quality of Altium designer. And I have now intention of throwing any more money at Altium until they pull their fingers out of their arses. It does seem indeed that Dave cynical view of them is highly accurate as at the moment they are chasing around trying to earn even more money by producing an even more expensive software than designer yet they can't even keep a proxy little program that studio working properly. The cost of circuit studio is as much money as I will begrudge them until they fix it. Unless of course they can make me a really good offer but somehow I doubt it because they are only in it for the money to the point that the product and the customer suffers.