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[^] KiCad is free and brilliant.
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I battled with Eagle, but gave up, tried using KiCAD better than Eagle, however it seems to be getting closer to Altium. There is was(?) a PCB designer called ProTel which was one of the parents of Altium, not too sure if it got abandoned but I found it online for a very low (cheap) price. Not too sure if all the latest foot prints are available though. 
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honey the codewitch wrote: I've been wrestling with EAGLE trying to build a schematic, and whoever designed it broke every possible rule of good UI design
Give it a try to KiCAD. After 25 years far from electrical diagrams and their related PCBs, it was enough for me to use it for a few days to create a complete project, starting from the electric diagram to Gerber and drilling files. As far as I know, people at CERN are heavily involved in the development and maintenance of this EDA tool. Which is free. A native auto router is missing, but AFAIK you can export the netlist to other free tools to re-import the auto-routing design to KiCad.
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Have you ever tried using Solidworks? It’s appalling from a UI point of view. I think a different team implemented each function without any holistic view of how it will all go together. The number of inconsistencies would probably get me banned for spamming if I listed them all!
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I'll put in another plug for KiCAD. I used Cadence stuff professionally before retiring, but now I only do occasional contracts and homers, it's not worth buying stuff. KiCAD is pretty good - pity I can't import my libraries from work, tho'!
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One other note about Kicad, it will import Eagle designs! I've tried it and it's not too bad of an import.
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I haven't used it too much, but you could give TinkerCad a try. Might be too basic for you tho.
TinkerCad[^]
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CADdyi by Microsoft
A free CAD software with premium features for the maker!
*If someone uses this name, you owe me money.
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119.
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This this right here. This is the reason I kept an old version of Visio from before they went all webby etc...
To err is human to really elephant it up you need a computer
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MS was good at creating visual designers. That was back in the days of Alan Cooper and his peers at Microsoft. Today, not so much. After several years of Xamarin, they still can't figure out how to make a XAML designer that supports Xamarin XAML. Now with MAUI and Blazor (HTML/CSS), no visual designer.
MS has lost their edge in understanding the value-add of rapid application design (RAD). They settle for syntactic sugar updates of little value to C#. Honestly, I am not sure there is anyone in MS' developer tools division that knows what value engineering is, and how it relates to making tools that advance RAD.
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Fair. I've been so immersed in C++ and IoT things, and before that, console based code generators that I haven't paid much attention to the goings on at MS as of late.
To err is human. Fortune favors the monsters.
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Agreed. As long as MS continue to support it after I've clawed my way up the learning curve.
I use Fusion 360 with a hobbyist license. It's getting much better with each release, but they keep moving features out of the free license into the paid license. Also, some of the folks that pay are complaining that you now have to pay for some of the analysis features as a service. Most of the analysis tools used to run locally.
I used Blender in the past but switched to Fusion360 for the drawing and drafting features, but Blender now has more engineering features. I may switch back if Fusion360 continues to paywall more features.
Sad, though, since the learning curve for Fusion360 is so steep.
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Actually, Microsoft bought Visio back in 2000 (I think) and then merged it into their system. I'd used pre-Microsoft versions of Visio but never bothered with the Microsoft version since my usage was rather infrequent.
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They also bought VBA from Summit
But they improved on those things.
To err is human. Fortune favors the monsters.
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EAGLE 7 was the last best version, after Autodesk took it on they butchered the licensing and made the software almost impossible to use offline. I would recommend KICAD, bit of a learning curve but worth it, another popular one is EASYEDA.
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My first post. And LMMFAO, Microsoft creating CAD software???!!!???!!! Oh hell no!
Microsoft would end up with a product that would be bloated beyond the worst bloated ROMs for Android devices ending with the BSOD.
We are in desperate need of high-end engineering/analysis software for Linux. I don't care about the flavor of said Linux distro, just a rewrite of SolidWorks. Is this asking too much???!!!???!!!???!!!
Before anyone types/posts, I'm very much aware of the amount of work that goes into developing software especially high-end parametric modelers and optimization/analysis stuff...
~jp
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Woohoo, my desk is arriving today. I can finally retire my current wobbly furniture from its current post and make it an electronics bench.
This excites me. Even the thought of assembling it. How goofy is that? 
When I was younger I was harder please.
To err is human. Fortune favors the monsters.
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Oh, so you'll be replacing a wobbly factory-bought desk with a wobbly self-assembled desk... 
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.
-- 6079 Smith W.
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Ha. This one wasn't assembled by the factory either. I actually inherited it from a friend - a convenience at the time, and the desk has since survived a move, but barely. I just never got around to replacing it.
The new one is 90% steel so it should be fairly secure and easy to assemble. Not a fan of particle board.
To err is human. Fortune favors the monsters.
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I inherited mine from a friend as well - steel base and veneered chipboard top. Interestingly, the veneer is "rough" on the bottom and "fine" on top to make it appear more like one solid piece of wood!
I modified it recently, by cutting away about a third in a fairly "swoopy" shape to fit my new* chair in between it and the door with enough space for Herself to get between them. Since the top is wood, that was really easy: make a template in plywood, follow that with a router, and finish with hot glue veneer edging. Looks like it was designed like that! 
"New" to me: it was made in the 1880 ~ 1890s ... I just had it reupholstered and made a frame with casters to lift it to desk height. Solid leather, springs, and horsehair - none of that foam which squashes down when the warranty expires. I'd had enough of paying through the nose for Chinese rubbish which leaves you sitting on the wooden base after a few months.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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You're a maker. You like making things.
I enjoyed putting together my grandson's Power Wheels last week. The stickers were a pain but other than that.
I’ve given up trying to be calm. However, I am open to feeling slightly less agitated.
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A wobbly electronics workbench might present a challenge while trying to solder...
If you think 'goto' is evil, try writing an Assembly program without JMP.
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I don't solder at my bench. I just prototype there. I solder on the kitchen table where it's more solid and I have more room.
To err is human. Fortune favors the monsters.
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Congratulations! 
You've just reminded me that the desk I'm using was the first piece of furniture I ever bought - in 1982. If I hadn't just spent $750 on a new water heater being delivered today, I'd go desk shopping!
Will Rogers never met me.
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honey the codewitch wrote: When I was younger I was harder please
Then I read the subject again. I cannot comment, as that breaks the KSS rule.
So, "furniture" eh? 
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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