Moving to Altium Designer From Orcad

Moving to Altium Designer From OrCAD
In OrCAD’s Capture, a part is a logical entity that is described by symbol graphics, pins and various
properties. As parts are placed in a schematic design, Capture maintains the identity of the part for
back annotation, net listing, bills of materials, and so forth. At the very minimum, a part requires a part
name, a part reference prefix, and a name of a PCB footprint.
These two definitions that use the same term depending on the context of design may initially cause
some confusion in the new environment which uses the term component instead. But it is not unlike
how things work in Altium Designer except that the schematic symbol is effectively the component for
all phases of design, and not just the schematic capture portion of it.
Altium Designer components
1..n
=
Multiple footprints
Altium Designer Component
=
1..255
symbols
Multiple Simulation / 3D /
SI models
Figure 11. Altium Designer symbols can have multiple footprints and symbol models.
In Altium Designer, the logical symbol is assumed to be the essential starting point of a component. It
can be initially defined at minimum as a name in a schematic library to which pins and any graphical
symbols or alternative display options needed for implementation may be added. This flexibility allows
a component to be represented in different ways during the design and capture process. This may not
only be as a logical symbol on the schematic, but also be a footprint on the PCB or even as a SPICE
definition for simulation.
The fundamentals of how components are defined, their properties, and basic relationships
between components, models and library concepts are explained further in Component, Model, and
Library Concepts.
14 AP0132 (v2.1) February 21, 2006
=
1..n