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After 36 years as a paid product, the Micro-Cap Circuit Simulator is now free
- dang 7y agoI pinched the title from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20495077 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20495077 since it's more informative. If this is inaccurate, please let us know. (Submitted title was "Micro-Cap User Downloads – Now Free".)
- macintux 7y ago40 years isn’t bad for a small software shop. I hope Mr. Thompson is satisfied with how things turned out. Anyone here use the software?
- madengr 7y agoI used this in 1991 as an EE undergrad. I initially used it on my 8086, 4.77 MHz XT. It took several minutes to simulate a simple common emitter amp. I don’t remember if I had an 8087 FPU. I then bought a 486DX, 50 MHz and the same simulation was finished before the mouse button lifted. Fun times. Microcap was really cool at the time as it was the only GUI based SPICE, and the student version was under $50. Nowadays I use LTSpice specifically since LT makes good switching regulators, and only develops those models for LTSpice. Otherwise I use Microwave Office. MC still looks much more polished than LTSpice, at least the GUI. Schematic entry in LTSpice is still abysmal.
- m0xte 7y agoYes also LTspice has some horrible clunk and bugs in it.
- gowld 7y agoHow does this compare to modern circuit simulators? https://www.tinkercad.com/ https://www.tinkercad.com/ (Web) http://www.virtualbreadboard.com/ http://www.virtualbreadboard.com/ (Windows)
- madengr 7y agoIt doesn’t. Those are not professional level simulators. MC is a modern simulator, and professional level. I assume the guy is retiring. You are not going to be simulating large ICs, but it’s still plenty good for other stuff.
- emmanueloga_ 7y agoThere's so pretty much seemingly unique proprietary software. A while ago I found this awesome logic minimizer called "logic Friday". [1] I don't think there's a free or open source version of a tool like this. I have an idea that the "espresso" algorithm could be used to minimize not only electronic circuits but general boolean expressions for any programming language... I think it would do for a useful refactoring tool. 1: https://web.archive.org/web/20131022051516/http://www.sontrak.com/screenshots.html https://web.archive.org/web/20131022051516/http://www.sontra...
- thaumasiotes 7y ago> I have an idea that the "espresso" algorithm could be used to minimize not only electronic circuits but general boolean expressions for any programming language... I think it would do for a useful refactoring tool. I think the goal for most boolean expressions in code is for the reader to be able to conceptually grasp what's being checked for, not for the expression to be as short as possible. Distributive properties can make an expression shorter while simultaneously making the concepts behind the expression much more obscure.
- monocasa 7y agoIt's useful in the compiler. For instance one optimization I haven't seen but would like to is going from if( value1 < 0 || value2 < 0 || value3 < 0 ) { to temp = value1 | value2 | value3; if( temp < 0 ) { Taking a sort of hardware, Boolean logic view makes this possible, as VHDL generally does this when synthesed.
- thaumasiotes 7y agoThat optimization fudges the difference between boolean or (comparing truth values) and bitwise or. It happens to work under the safe assumption that value1, value2, and value3 use sign bits (as all two's-complement integers do), but logically it's a disaster.
- 7y ago
- monoideism 7y agoI'd love to try it out, but I'm not downloading an executable from an `http` URL. Edit: I hope the downvotes are because it supports `https` (just not by default, thanks to progman32 for correcting me) and not because you think that not wanting to download an executable over an open connection is an unreasonable thing.
- dmitrygr 7y agoOk. Don't. Looking a gift horse in the mouth?
- monoideism 7y agoYou would download an executable over an unencrypted connection? Whether it's free or not?
- classics2 7y agoThat’s what digital signatures are for. So yes.
- monoideism 7y agoFair enough, I gladly use apt for the same reason. But I mean download unsigned executables over an unencrypted connection, like this site is by default. You do it?
- someguydave 7y agoyes. it's amusing how many people confuse transport layer security with application layer security.
- monoideism 7y agoI've published signed debian packages to PPAs, so I'm well aware. My question was in relation to a unsigned executable on an unencrypted http site, as the OP site loads by default. Would you download and run one?
- anonymou2 7y agofree as in free beer
- ngcc_hk 7y agoOpen source possible?
- fizixer 7y agongspice
- nrclark 7y agoThis is very exciting! Especially the SPICE model library. Microcap's libraries have lots of SPICE models that I haven't seen anywhere else. Being able to grab them will be awesome, even if I wind up using them with LTSPICE.
- willis936 7y agoI’m not familiar with microcap, but I am familiar with LTSpice. If they’re both free SPICE GUIs, surely microcap must be better than LTSpice. I can’t imagine any interface worse than LTSpice.
- cushychicken 7y agoLTSpice for OS X is a special kind of frustrating.
- madengr 7y agoMore than just GUIs, rather SPICE compatible simulators. LTSpice has macro models for most LT parts, that would not be compatible with MC. Likewise MC probably has models that are not compatible with LTSpice. Now I wish LTSpice would take MC GUI and features, and implement it with their simulator. They should have bought it.
- peter_retief 7y agoI have never heard of this, is it appropriate to ask if anyone could describe it in one sentence?
- scaryclam 7y agoIt's software for simulating circuits.
- peter_retief 7y agoAt the moment I use Linux (Didn't see any Linux ports?) with ngSpice, I haven't found ngSpice that useful though
- rusticpenn 7y agoI found ngspice extremely useful. I have compared the results with Cadence Virtuoso and the results are usually identical or with negligeble difference. I am trying to use a combination of ngspice and magic for IC design.
- forgotpwd16 7y agoMicro-Cap is Windows-only software (it runs on Linux via Wine though) and perhaps more accessible than your current (which probably is "make circuits somewhere, generate netlist, simulate with ngspice, analyze somewhere else") workflow as it has an integrated schematic editor. The most powerful Linux alternative to Micro-Cap et al is probably KiCad.
- peter_retief 7y agoThanks, I will stick to KiCad and ngspice (when I need it) I am a hobbyist and dont have complicated needs. Not a fan of Wine.
- commandlinefan 7y agoThank you for asking - I was a little afraid to ask as well.
- garganzol 7y agoThe website says that the company was closed. Does anyone have an insight on why Spectrum Software is now closed? P.S. The man behind the company, Andy Thompson, seems to be an excessively humble person. He left a lot of details in the mist. However, all these details are priceless to us mere humans. Memoirs? A blog? 39 years in business is not a small feat.
- rubidium 7y agoPerhaps his humility is the most important lesson to learn, esp. in the dominant culture of tech today.
- CoolGuySteve 7y agoAnd maybe the true payments were the friends he made along the way... There needs to be a name for this kind of dead end aphorism thinking.
- justwalt 7y agoCliche? Cheese? “The true payments,” haha.
- znpy 7y agoAfter 39 years the authors might have just retired. Maybe their customer base was too small and their reference market too saturated to convince anyone to buy it.
- znpy 7y agoIt seems to be working with Wine under GNU/Linux. I'll try it better when I get home.
- modo_mario 7y agoAny chance of it becoming FOSS?
- lsiebert 7y agoI really hope someone mirrors this on github or something, because there is no guarantee that a website for a closed company will be around for any length of time. I lost some important records because yahoo shut down it's group archive last year (and banned the archive team from saving stuff wtf), and it's been on my mind lately.
- betamaxthetape 7y agoWe (ArchiveTeam) are still trying to archive portions of Yahoo Groups (our methods have changed a bit since Yahoo turned off the web archive in December, but the data isn't deleted until Jan 31). What's the name of the group?
- crtasm 7y agoIf you're a member of the group (or can join it now) it's only a few clicks to make a request for the data. Doesn't get absolutely everything but all the emails/posts should be included. https://www.theverge.com/2019/11/4/20917500/yahoo-group-data-download-how-to https://www.theverge.com/2019/11/4/20917500/yahoo-group-data...
- scrumper 7y agoIs this good for analog stuff, at least as effective as LTSpice? I've been using the latter on a Mac for simulating vacuum tube (UK: valve) circuits with some success and a very large amount of frustration. I would love something a little less actively user-hostile...
- compumike 7y agoWhat makes LTSpice seem so "actively user-hostile" to you? (Founder of https://www.circuitlab.com/ https://www.circuitlab.com/ (YC W13), an analog circuit simulator that many universities have now started using.)
- scrumper 7y agoI didn't grow up with it, so coming at it from a perspective of someone who's gotten used to modern software, it's remarkably hard to learn. The interface is weird. Placement of components isn't so bad but when you want to do stuff like move them or rotate, you fall into this strange mode system that's unlike any other software I've ever used. Including models is done by writing arcane text commands on the diagram. And also by setting parameters in a hidden window on the component diagram itself. Models != visual components. Sometimes I have to set the model designator for a component in the UI twice before it'll "take". That's hostile! Finickity pin alignment on custom/3rd party components sometimes leads to open circuits when they look closed. The parameter/settings windows are cryptic. The wire drawing tool is really nice though. It's obviously better than writing a setlist in TextEdit but I've found the learning curve very steep, with all the underlying complexity of Spice exposed. The fairly prehistoric interface paradigm that means that any muscle memory and expectations from using any other graphical software just don't help. In fact, they hurt. I tried your thing when I was looking for circuit design software. I liked it. It didn't have any vacuum tube models at the time (not that I blame you, it's niche) and so I couldn't use it for what I needed.
- compumike 7y agoThose all make sense. Thanks!
- forgotpwd16 7y agoFree as in beer. It will have been ever better if it had been released as free software.
- extra__tofu 7y agoWow, used this extensively in my undergrad. Always used the free version. I remember occasionally running into the "too many nodes" error. Thanks to the creator for releasing the full version for free. I'm sure many EE undergrads will be grateful.