Altium Develop vs. National Instruments LabVIEW

Altium 365 is fantastic for students learning about PCB design and for large team-based PCB projects. Because this product is relatively easier to use than other ECAD software and it enables collaboration, students and professional engineers would greatly benefit from having this software in their skill set. In other words, Altium 365 is great for academic and industry purposes.

Incentivized

Most of the time, I am using LabVIEW to develop automated controls for lab-scale and pilot-scale systems. LabVIEW is great for its graphical programming interface, which is easy to learn and understand. The program also has a lot of built-in VIs to perform different complicated I/O, data processing, controls, and graphing tasks which are extremely useful and convenient to use. My only problem with LabVIEW is how hard it is to clean up and debug the program, due to its being a graphical interface. It is hard to search for specific variables when debugging, and some of the online debugging features don't function well in real-time.

Incentivized

• BOM management - with just a little bit of extra care any designer produces a usable bom along with their pcb design ready to be ordered
• 365 - being able to view and review (placing comments) projects without the need to have the software installed locally
• Multi-pcb projects

Incentivized

• real-time data visualization
• implementation of modern control strategies
• integration of languages such as python and c++, for various applications
• data acquisition through microcontroller cards

Incentivized

• The tools organization section has too many tools that are easy to lose.
• Save settings for multi-projects and reuse settings from other projects in new ones.
• Better import final designs into multiple formats (details are often lost when imported into CAD formats).

• Barrier to entry is large
• Install times are crazy
• Just in time help needs to be more apparent (most students do not know about the examples section)

ALTIUM DESIGNER is the reference tool in the electronic circuit design sector, its use is widespread worldwide. Although there are other alternatives, some of them free do not rival ALTIUM DESIGNER in terms of features and reliability. It is also very practical to request quotes with ALTIUM DESIGNER BOM reports since all suppliers are accustomed to using the tool.

Incentivized

Like any complicated program, it will always need some room for improvement. For example, it would be nicer to have other shortcuts than just the numpad Asterisk as the layer shift shortcut, or easy to shift layers via other ways. Some programs use a space bar instead, or similar. It would also be nice to manipulate or make 3D items better

Incentivized

Not very stable. Sudden lack of functionality when the license expires is not indicated clearly and can lead to loss of work.

Incentivized

I use the educational Program. And so far is the best technical support. Every time that I need one or I have a question. They respond so far and with excellent advice.

Incentivized

easy to follow, Good technical materials. good videos The platform is easy to use.

Incentivized

Some times it is slow down PC due to polygons

Incentivized

OrCAD was used at our company for years before we switched over to Altium Designer. Usually, moving all projects from one software can be a pain and time-consuming. Altium Designer made it very streamline to move all projects over, including all component libraries. In addition, on the Mechanical Engineering side of things, Altium Designer has wonderful integration with SOLIDWORKS, so all parts can be 3D modeled and brought over.

Incentivized

We have used MatLab's data acquisition toolbox in the past which was not too bad either, especially if you prefer the text-based programming format. The only problem with that was that the library of compatible data acquisition hardware was somewhat limited and if your hardware is not from one of the more popular brands like NI there is a good possibility that you won't be able to use it with your MatLab script. LAstly, the amount of supporting material (tutorials, etc.) is very limited as it is not a very popular tool

Incentivized

Because, in my opinion, usage for small organization is poor, it is difficult to set up initial configuration to support scaling.

Incentivized

• I can only guess, but I think the investment, at least for real industry, is a no-brainer. The labor savings are obvious and far over the outlay.
• To be more specific, the time saved on component selection/procurement is phenomenal. I will no longer waste days poring over catalogs and websites.
• The biggest downside I know of is the time spent explaining the above to the accounts department because, let's face it, it's still pretty spendy.

Incentivized

• We are able to save money by writing our own programs instead of outsourcing.
• We recently bought a new force test stand and we are able to use LabVIEW to write a program that fits our needs exactly instead of making due with what came with the stand.
• When our customers ask us to do data acquisition, we know that we can always make a solution.

Incentivized