PCB Routing Guidelines for Altium Designer

Routing PCB traces is one of the most important aspects of PCB design, and these routing guidelines will help you as you work in Altium Designer.

ALTIUM DESIGNER

Great PCB design software making even complicated routing look simple.

Routing traces and vias on a PCB design is often thought of as a simple task. After setting up the footprint library and then perfecting the placement of the components on the board, it would seem a relatively easy matter to simply “hook ‘em up.” While that may have been true back in the days of routing 12 mil traces on simple boards, today’s design requirements are much more complex. There are specific size and topology rules for power, differential pair, high-speed, RF, and rigid-flex printed circuit board design routing technologies to name a few of the challenges that engineers face today. PCB designers like you need the latest information on routing techniques as well as design tools that can intelligently help you to successfully route today’s PCB designs.

Fortunately, there is a lot of help available to you from Altium. You will see below some of the guidelines and helpful tips for routing different technologies available from Altium’s vast library of technical resources. As for routing your PCB layout design, Altium has provided a wealth of routing features in Altium Designer; the premier toolset for PCB design engineers like yourself. Armed with both the power of Altium Designer and the routing information resources, you will be well on your way to creating superior PCB designs.

PCB Routing Guidelines for the Best Quality PCBs

There are a lot of rules and techniques associated with PCB trace routing. The resources that Altium provides are not only useful guidelines for beginners in PCB design, but are also applicable when PCB routing in Altium Designer. The more information that you can learn about PCB routing will ultimately help you to avoid errors and problems that might mess up your PCB Design. It will also help you to make important choices for your routing such as determining the best trace widths and routing topologies for specific scenarios.

Below are three examples of some of the resources that are available. First, there are some basic guidelines for routing followed by some reasons why you should look into using an auto router to help with your routing. Lastly, you will find some information on dealing with crosstalk in your PCB routing.

PCB Design Guidelines that are a Mouse-Click Away

Making sure that you are successful as a PCB designer is an important goal for us, which is why we have included design resources on our website.

• Understanding printed circuit board trace routing concerns and best practices will better help you on the road to successful routing.

  Learn More about some basic routing guidelines that will help your design be successful.

• Auto routing can be a tremendous help for routing your PCB design, here are some of the benefits.

  Learn More about how PCB design auto routing software can help you.

• Understanding the potential problems with crosstalk on your PCB design will help you to be better prepared in your routing to avoid it.

  Learn More about routing best practices to avoid crosstalk in your design.

Altium Designer allows you to adhere to routing guidelines with its advanced rules and constraints

With Both the Schematic and the PCB, Altium Designer Prepares Your Design for Routing

In order to start trace routing, you first need a completed schematic and a layout that is placed and ready to route. For this, you need a powerful schematic capture and PCB editor at your disposal. Being able to work with simulators and analyzers for determining your design parameters such as PCB stack-up layers to high-speed signal integrity constraints will be another key to your success. Altium Designer is ready to help you here with one of the most versatile suites of printed circuit board design tools on the market today.

With Altium Designer’s powerful schematic editor, you will be able to quickly and easily create your PCB circuitry for everything from nets to decoupling capacitors. Whether it is a simple one page schematic or the most complex multi-channel hierarchical design, Altium Designer’s schematic capture editor is the right tool for the job. On the layout side of your design, you will need a full set of design rules to serve as the layout guidelines for your routing. Altium Designer contains one of the most advanced set of rules available allowing you to set up the precise rules and constraints for your design.

Powerful and Intuitive Design Tools for the Best Quality PCBs

Altium Designer is a full-featured suite of PCB design software that is easy to use for the creation of your PCB manufacturing designs.

• For the best routing results set up constraints, work with analysis tools and leverage the full capabilities of your PCB routing software.

  Learn More about setting up your design for routing and different auto routing options.

• Altium Designer’s schematic capture editor will get your circuitry laid out quickly and efficiently.

  Learn More about how Altium Designer’s schematic capture will help set up your design for routing.

• Successful routing depends on the design rules that you have set up, and Altium Designer will help you with a full set of comprehensive rules and constraints.

  Learn More about design rules Altium Designer.

Altium Designer’s Active Route allows you to direct the path of the auto routing

Superior Routing Using Altium Designer as Your PCB Design Tools

The routing on your PCB design is a critical part of the job, but that doesn’t mean that it has to be a nightmare for you to accomplish. By using PCB design software that has been created to help you to route your board, you can become a PCB fabrication artist in the creation of a masterpiece of routing. The key is to use software that has advanced routing functionality that is easy to use while producing productive results. With a plethora of these capabilities, Altium Designer was created for PCB designers just like you.

Altium Designer’s interactive routing has been designed to give you every advantage possible. From its advanced net analyzer to the multiple routing options such as walk-around, push, shove, or ignore obstacles, Altium Designer has the routing features you need. When it comes to high-speed design, Altium Designer is equipped with xSignals; a tool to help you define your high-speed routing topologies. With trace lengths, matched lengths and trace tuning functionality, you will have optimum control over your critical signals. And when you have large busses and other time-consuming routing tasks, Altium Designer is once again ready to help with Active Route; a user-guided auto routing feature. By defining the path that you want your bus to take, Active Route will create the precision routing results that you want at auto routing speeds without the messy routing created by a traditional auto router.

Advanced Routing Technology for Your PCB Layout

Interactive routing, high-speed routing, and auto routing; Altium Designer has the functionality you need to get the job done.

• Altium Designer’s interactive routing has the multiple routing options and configurations you need.

  Learn More about Altium Designer’s powerful and intelligent routing tools.

• Altium Designer’s xSignals will allow you to setup and configure your high-speed routing constraints.

  Learn More about setting up your design for high-speed routing in Altium Designer.

• Do you want to speed up your routing but are tired of cleaning up the mess of an auto router? Check out Altium Designer’s Active Route and see how user-guided auto routing can help you.

  Learn More about using Altium Designer’s Active Route in this brief tutorial.

All the advance tools that you need to complete your PCB trace routing faster and with better results are ready and waiting for you in Altium Designer.