|
> As someone who's manufactured thousands of PCB designs, I couldn't disagree with this article/video more. I think you're vastly overstating how much "bad" advice there is in the video, and the degree to which aesthetics are opposed to function. It is possible to get silly (e.g. luridly coloured PCBs, "artistic" routing, and silkscreen-as-canvas), but this video doesn't push very hard. Phil mostly stresses attention to consistency in placement, routing, and silkscreen, which is 100% solid. A PCB layout is like a schematic: it's read far more than it's written, and efforts to make it legible and coherent have an excellent payoff/effort ratio. Efforts here make bring-up, rework, debugging, and overall comprehension easier for the EEs involved. They also make the design more accessible to non-EEs, which fosters collaboration with mechanical/thermal, assembly, debugging, etc. They may have minor impacts on cost and manufacturability, but the right compromises are usually obvious if the knowledge is there. There is a design sensibility for PCBs that combines form and function without compromising either. Most experienced EEs can tell with a single glance whether a board was laid out with care by an experienced practitioner or not. I find good PCB design to be beautiful by construction, in the same way that good architecture is beautiful by construction (and not by slapping lipstick on a pig). |