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LibrePCB is a free, cross-platform, easy-to-use electronic design automation suite (librepcb.org)
submitted 2 days ago by cm0002@lemmy.world to c/opensource@programming.dev
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[-] FizzyOrange@programming.dev 7 points 2 days ago

The documentation looks excellent!

I'm definitely going to try this for my next PCB project. I've tried basically all of the other free options (Designspark PCB, Eagle, Kicad, Geda, Horizon) and Horizon is the only one really worth using IMO (Designspark PCB is also decent).

Eagle and Geda are trash. Don't waste your time.

Kicad should be great, but they've made a number of insane UX decisions that make it really unusable in practice. Horizon is actually based on the pretty good Kicad engine but it fixes most of the UX mess.

[-] suicidaleggroll@lemmy.world 7 points 2 days ago

Kicad should be great, but they’ve made a number of insane UX decisions that make it really unusable in practice. Horizon is actually based on the pretty good Kicad engine but it fixes most of the UX mess.

Do you have an example? I use KiCAD pretty regularly, and while they do have some odd defaults for a lot of their tools and keybindings, I rarely run into one that can't be changed/fixed in the settings.

[-] FizzyOrange@programming.dev 1 points 1 day ago

I haven't used it for a very long time but IIRC if you drag a component in the schematic view, by default it leaves all the wires behind!

I also recall they have a super confusing file format (a .pretty directory or something? Wtf is that?). I note that LibrePCB claims one of its features is a sane file format, presumably in response to that.

[-] TheHobbyist@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 days ago

I picked up LibrePCB almost 2 years ago and it's been a pleasant learning curve. I can highly recommend it, both for beginners and more advanced users.

It is still missing some few features like auto routing, but if you don't use it, it does a great job.

this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2025
54 points (98.2% liked)

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