Jon Chandler wrote:
> The other strong recommendation is to use Advanced Circuits FreeDFM
> service.

Hmm.  I tried it a few times and was not impressed.  It seemed to find
trivial things that weren't errors at all.  You think you've submitted a
board to Advanced Circuits and go home.  Then you find out that Free DFM
kicked out some stuff which aren't errors, but which hold up your board
anyway.  One more day lost.

Free DFM also checks against the Advanced Circuit desing rules, which may
not be the rules you want to design against.  For example, I like to stick
to 8mil width and space unless there is a good reason not to.  Every board
house I've run accross can do at least that, most can do better.  I think
Gold Phoenix specifies 7/7 mil for their low cost prototype service.  They
can do better, but charge extra.  AC probably has more relaxed rules from
the start.  So a board that Free DFM says is OK may not be OK for the Gold
Phoenix low cost prototype service.

Checking the board is what the Eagle DRC is for.  On every design you shoul=
d
run ERC when done with the schematic, then DRC before releasing the board.
I actually run DRC several times on a board, particularly after I've done
some manual routing and I want to make sure I didn't violate spacing
somewhere.


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