It will give you a message if something is wrong Here you can change the footprint to a different variantĪfter finishing your schematic, and changing the PCB layout, go to Design->Update PCBĬlick Execute changes to export the changes to the Layout. PROTIP: Double clicking on a component selects it and opens properties Some components have the same schematic, but different footprints, the footprints can be selected at the bottom here, or later in schematic after selecting the component and going into properties Select the component you want to place, and make your schematic. You can also install the library’s so you no longer need to import them into your projects. If you added the library files in the first step, you can now select them here. On the right side, this panel will pop up. In the schematic click place part in order to get the parts view on the right side. These can be compiled and installed into altium, but I usually just add them to projects manually.ĭrag them under your project in order to access them in the components view.Ĭreating a new project is easy, go to Files->NEW->ProjectĪdd a schematic with right clicking on the project, add new to project and schematic. To import a library just double click it or drag it into Altium. The 3D models are incorporated into the library, but if you are looking for a 3D model, they can usually be found in the 3D model folder. It includes both footprint and schematic symbols. Here you will find my component library, I update it with new components regularly. The included ones are absolutely garbage, so I made my own library that I've posted to Github The hard part with Altium is the component library. So far I have 3 friends that have obtained the license, and the initial feedback is that it's smoother than KiCAD and user friendly. Student licenses are now free for Altium so I will recommend getting a license even if you are a beginner. Leave a comment if you start using Altium based on this article, and let me know what you think!Īltium has a huge forum for customer feedback on the product, so if you want anything changed, leave a comment there.įirstly we will need to get a Altium License:

Altium designer pcb layer