Calculator Settings

The calculator has been improved a lot but it still need some love.

For instance, the default Relative Dielectric Constants, Er is 4.6. But there is no material that has this value. However the FR4 (which is the first thing in that list, and I believe could be the default, is 4.5 in the list). So, from where this 4.6 comes? Also, the items on this list could be better formatted, like Capitalized, maybe with a monospaced font or a column for the value and another for the Name of it. Also, the first thing could be the Item name, not the value, if using 2 columns, of course.

Input fields could also have a tooltip, since here, we are seeing some items being represented by their constant which sometimes are Greek letters. But for someone (like me), they may not be clear and having a Greek letter alone is not helpful so it is harder to look for backup info on Google. Also, there are different places (linke in the PCBNew that have different symbols, sometimes a Latin character instead of the Greek letter. It would be easier to understand if those constants could have the same name/symbol everywhere.

Here is an example of a different name for the same constant.

Also, PCBNew could have a link/button to the calculator, to launch it using current pcb settings so it would be faster to calculate stuff to the current board.

Another thing that could happen is that the popup windows could be wide enough to at least show the whole title visible.

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A dielectric constant of 4.6 is not a bad starting point. JLC’s 7628 common prepreg (and core) are 4.6 for example, but:

is a very good idea.

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True, but my point is that there is no item with that value on the list.

I would also suggest displaying the item name somewhere when the item is chosen from the dropdown list. If the user types a value, this field could display Custom or something.

That’s somewhat “ehhhhhh” for FR4 which is one of the worst materials for dielectric constant. 4.5 and 4.6 are both made up numbers and the material ranges anywhere from 3 to 5. You often need to consult your PCB MFG for their exact FR4 they use to get the correct dielectric if its important. Doing that “display FR-4 or custom” would suddenly imply we have a single good value for FR4 which is impossible and a lie.

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Fine. But I am not talking about the PCB or the manufacturability. I’m talking about software consistency and user interface.

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