Problems with mentor exp. dashboard

[odesus]

Dear Comunity:

I have some troubles with dahsboard component of mentor expedition 2005 service pack 1 suite. when I try to open a new file It presents the next error:

Runtime error. Abnormal termination. Instruction 0x7587ca cand read memory 0x000001c. All other componentes seems to work ok.

What could be the problem, Many thanks.

[Gizzmo]

Humm in my years of dealing with Mentor and Cadence, i never really attempt to figure out why and what random little errors are.

Most of the time, in my case at least, its because some update or other piece of CAD/PCB software changed something and screwed up my other software. Between FLEXLM, dongles, drivers, environment variables and windows its somewhat of a IT nightmare to run various PCB software together. <---sorry for my long IT rant.

My solution (as well as i am sure Mentor's will be) is to reinstall over the top of the installation and patch it up to the current version (within your licensing)

[odesus]

Dear Gizzmo:

Thanks for your answer. I have also the mentor expedition suite 2005 normal, I mean no service pack 1. Do you consider this a good option for working, Are there many improvements on service pack1? What do you suggest?

As an expert on Mentor and Cadence, Which one do you consider best for PCB design as a complete integrated enviroment?

Many thanks for your appreciable suggestions and comments.

[Gizzmo]

Dear Gizzmo:

Thanks for your answer. I have also the mentor expedition suite 2005 normal, I mean no service pack 1. Do you consider this a good option for working, Are there many improvements on service pack1? What do you suggest?

As an expert on Mentor and Cadence, Which one do you consider best for PCB design as a complete integrated enviroment?

Many thanks for your appreciable suggestions and comments.

Mentor is going to suggest running the latest. The only reason i wouldnt be running the latest mentor or cadence release would be if i customer requests a older tool. (Some big company's dont want to jump into the newest release for a few months until the bugs are worked out)

Mentor and Cadence seem to be on the top of the food chain at our firm. We've used Cadence a little more as a complete solution with more of the schematic work being done in Orcad then PCB work in Cadence. Of course right now we are getting a flood of requests for work done in Expedition.

We also are seeing a small requests for Altium P-CAD/Protel routing that we normally just translate to Mentor Expedition or Cadence.

We also get a lot of Boardstation requests which is what a number of our designers "grew up" with and what we started off doing so we have a number of licenses for it.

I cant just pick one design suite to go with, because work comes in waves and it seems every wave is a different design suite. :)

[Skip Yutkus]

Aw Geez! now you've gone and done it, as a fprmer BS user I've found that there are 2 opinions of this tool 1. It's OK, (people who grew up using it) 2. It's the absolute biggest POS ever written, (people who've used other EDA software and then used BS). I fall in th latter catagory - in it's defense, it's the only package that can do TRUE concurrent design.

Skip

[Gizzmo]

Aw Geez! now you've gone and done it, as a fprmer BS user I've found that there are 2 opinions of this tool 1. It's OK, (people who grew up using it) 2. It's the absolute biggest POS ever written, (people who've used other EDA software and then used BS). I fall in th latter catagory - in it's defense, it's the only package that can do TRUE concurrent design.

Skip

The fun part is when people want there designs translated from Cadence, Expedition, P-cad BACK INTO Boardstation, its hours of fun and entertainment for me.....

[Skip Yutkus]

The easiest way I know of is via Specctra - but even that is a major undertaking - I feel your pain!:)

Skip