Overview

Footprints provide a means of physically attaching components to your PCB, and they provide electrical connectivity as defined by the netlist generated in Capture. While the Demo version of Layout contains only a few footprints in the Ex-gui.LLB library, version 10.5 contains thousands of footprints within many different libraries. Although the libraries are comprehensive, there will be times when you will need to make your own.

This purpose of this chapter is to:

1. introduce the Library Manager,

2. introduce Layout s footprint libraries and naming conventions,

3. discuss the composition of a footprint,

4. demonstrate the basic process of making a footprint,

5. provide a detailed explanation of padstacks,

6. provide footprint and padstack design examples, and

7. demonstrate how to use the pad array generator for pin grid arrays (PGAs) and ball grid arrays (BGAs).

Introduction to the Library Manager

The padstacks, footprints, and footprint libraries in OrCAD Layout are handled using the Library Manager. To use the Library Manager, open Layout and, from the session frame, select Library Manager from the Tools pulldown menu, or if you have a design (.MAX) file open, you can click the button on the toolbar. The Library Manager is shown in Fig. 8-1. Within the main window are two windows: the Library Manager itself and an editing window. At the top of the editing window the title Library Pin Tool (DRC Off) will be displayed if you have the Pin Tool button selected or