KiCAD Schematics Windows TUTORIAL
This tutorial is intended for beginners in printed circuit board design who wish to design a Schematics using the free KiCAD Schematics Capture Tool.INTRODUCTION
There are a large number of professional EDA tools for Schematics Capture - that includes Cadencde OrCAD,Allegro's , Altium, Cadststar and many more. The tools are expensive and out of the reach of many small organizations looking into designing and building small circuits. Fortunately, KiCAD provides a simpler alternative.
This Tutorial is intented for Schematics Capture using the Windows version. There is a Linux version of this tutorial as well ( Coming soon).
Those who had experience with one or more Schematics Capture design tool may skip this page. Others may like to get a general view of the PCB design process, which is follows:
1. Select the components (capacitors, sockets, etc.) you will be using on your board. Once you have a list, collect the datasheets and look at the suggested schematics in those datasheets.
In actual practice following are the main categories of the components used
Resistors, Capacitors, Inductors, Ferrite Beads
Diodes, Transistors, FETS, LEDs
Connectors, Headers
ICs, BGA ICs
Others
2. For each component, you have to create a Symbol of the Component in the Library. Symbols is a physical view of the component that includes all the pins of the components and one or more properties. The component must have an associated footprint that will be used for Layout.
In practice, you will already have most of the libraries available and you should need to create only few additional symbol libraries for a new design. You will need to be careful to verify that the existing library in your design library matches the component according to its datasheet.
There are reference designs available from companies like freescale, Texas Instruments. You may get the Orcad Symbol from them.
3. To create a Schematics get the components on your Schematics and connecting them with wires. You will add the Power and Ground as necessary. If your design spans more that one page you will need to connect them with off page connector.
4. Check your Schematics for design errors. Generate a net list. The net list is used by the Layout tools for importing.