N00b question- I always see people uploading computer done drawings of their circuits. I don't mean crazy PCB stuff, but just simple electronic diagrams with basic components. what the heck are people using to do this. everything I've found either sucks or is way to complicated.
Most schematics I've seen use Eagle. Fritzing is pretty popular as well especially when an arduino is of topic.
Easy to use, easy to learn, great for making drawings for posting here.
Fritzing as most people use it sucks - pictures of a chip with no indication of functionality at all.
Gave up on free years ago... you get what you pay for. Tried many but settled on splan by abacom.de
http://www.abacom-online.de/uk/html/splan.html
A buddy of mine sent me this yesterday... maybe this is what you're after? I tinkered with it for 5 mins, and it seems decent for what it does.
I have to agree with crossroads, Fritzing kinda sucks.
I never tried expresspcb but from what I've found out, if you want to make a pcb you'll have to find a company that will take the expresspcb proprietary format (so batchPCB is out of the question).
Crossroads, do you get your PCBs made with ExpressPCB or someone else?
I got the first batch of boards I ever purchased there, 15 cards full of LEDs that I cut in two.
Learned Eagle, have used iteadstudio.com, internationalcircuits.com since then (both China).
And Sunstone Circuits once when I was in a real hurry. Skipped soldermask, had a real hard time assembling without shorts to ground plane. Not doing a board without solder mask again!
OP did not ask about making cards tho, asked about creating easy schematic for posting. expresspcb is great for that.
I agree, expresspcb.com is the bomb for doing stuff like this! And I'm pretty sure you can get them to export your stuff to standard format if you really want them to. I think exporting it will cost you though. But for short runs, engineering and hobby stuff, I don't think you can beat it.
-jim lee
I was suggested to use ExpressPCB at first. It's very easy for beginners, it's almost immediate to handle. After a while you'll get to its limits and will start using something more flexible and complete like Eagle.
As a first time user, I'd suggest you ExpressPCB.