Hello everyone, Excuse for putting my 2 cents in; however, I feel one software package is being left out of the loop and should be a contender. While I was working in Austin we converted up from CADNETIX to VeriBest. We did do some evaluation on other CAD packages and decided, primarily due to cost of upgrading, to go with VeriBest. I am know using Cadence Allegro w/ CCT. I will not give my opinion on which is better; however, I will comment on some of the pro's and con's. Since I am not reviewing upgrades on VeriBest, I will reference Version 14 or VB97 against Cadence Allegro version 12. Routing - Veribest has a terrific interface within the Advance editor, it handles 45deg routing so much better then CCT/Allegro as far as push and shove is concerned. There were some quarks with the router modifying traces you didn't want modified; however, when I left my previous company there where enhancements scheduled to fix this problem. All and all you can hand route much faster within Veribest. Mechanical tools - Veribest runs on top of Microstation which gives users a complete mechanical package built into the tool. Of course more then half the stuff in Microstation will not be touched by the average designer, at least the capability is there if needed. Allegro appears to be adequate as far as board design is concerned. Defining rules - Veribest has a very friendly user interface for defining constraints on nets; however, we initially had problems with losing some of those constraints and spent some time entering them back in. Allegro is a bit more complicated; however, from what I have gathered from other power users, it has tremendous flexibility and stability. There have been some limitations that are being addressed. Stability - Veribest was running under NT and we had system problems causing some lost work. We also had an occasional corrupted database which would take sometime to repair. I have found Allegro to be very stable running under UNIX; however, I have not seen the NT interface and the potential problems that may occur. Autorouting - This is a tough one - I like the way Veribest uses gridless shape based routing without allowing crosses and conflicts, to add to this it's push and shove on 45deg routes makes it easy to complete the rest of the connections. CCT seems to have a high completion ratio; however, most designers take it back into the Allegro side for completion. Allegro is considered by most as an exacto knife. File structure - Allegro has everything built into one file; however, a far amount of knowledge has to be known to create shortcuts, batch programs, user configureabilty, etc.... as compared to Veribest. Veribest has a huge file structure with certain files depending on each other. This creates more room for having a corrupt data base and handling archiving and general file management. Veribest does have easily configurable user interface for creating shortcuts. I feel you have more flexibility with Allegro if you have the expertise, but you can get up and running much faster on Veribest with less flexibility in the long run. According to Karl Bates Cadence is at least better then Mentor. Summary, Allego/CCT Pro's - Stable, extensive rule set, extremely user configurable, good for ECN's, good file structure Allegro/CCT Con's - Poor interactive routing, must have extensive knowledge of programming to customize, limited mechanical tool, complicated rule set, set in there ways (to big to pay attention to the little guy) Veribest Pro's - Good interactive router, easily configurable, built in mechanical tool, nice interface for entering rules, good support group for enhancements. Veribest Con's - Unstable database, large file structure, limited rule set, more then what you need on mechanical tools. Shop around ....... Regards, Paul Danna PCB Design Compaq Computer Corp. Phone (281) 518-6735 PO Box 692000 Fax (281) 518-6122 MS080403 [log in to unmask] Houston, Texas 77269-2000 ################################################################ DesignerCouncil E-Mail Forum provided as a free service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8c ################################################################ To subscribe/unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the body: To subscribe: SUBSCRIBE DesignerCouncil <your full name> To unsubscribe: SIGNOFF DesignerCouncil ################################################################ Please visit IPC web site (http://jefry.ipc.org/forum.htm) for additional information. For the technical support contact Dmitriy Sklyar at [log in to unmask] or 847-509-9700 ext.311 ################################################################