Should you switch to KiCad 5.0?

General Electronics
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Originally published at: https://contextualelectronics.com/should-you-switch-to-kicad-5-0/

Should you consider moving to version 5.0, since the new release candidates (rc1) are now being tested? I don’t think so, yet. Watch below to learn more. Links from the video KiCad Hat: https://contextualelectronics.com/product/kicad-hat/ Wayne’s talk: https://fosdem.org/2018/schedule/event/cad_kicad_v5/ 5.0 nightly build: https://launchpad.net/~js-reynaud/+archive/ubuntu/kicad-5 Download the stable build (4.0.7): https://kicad.org Manufacturing: http://kicad.info/manufacturing/ Forum: https://forum.kicad.info/

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Has everyone moved to 5.0? Anyone?

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I have it installed on the Lab PC and have started “playing with it”. I have not tried anything serious. Opening existing projects gives messages about component remapping. In the PCSNew layout, I get an error on the “Tools” menu. There are some other things different regarding the OpenGL mode (F11) - this is now called something else and is no longer in the View menu.
I have not made time to follow these through to know if they are issues or features used the wrong way.

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Thanks Steve. I’ve downloaded it but haven’t installed. I’ve started to search through some of the issues people are having so I know what to do.

Are you running 4.0.7 at the same time?

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When I installed 5.0.0, it overwrites 4.0.7. So I don’t have that on this machine anymore

fixes the issue with the Tools menu - I just had to down load the latest installer for Windows.
I still have an issue with missing footprints on a couple of boards but I think this has to do with a footprints from other local libraries gone missing rather than a direct issue with PCBNew. Just not sure why or how yet.

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Although I’ve been tempted, I haven’t installed version 5 yet. I was planning on using it for my next project, but was going to wait and see if there were issues with the initial release. I will most likely give it another month or two to let things settle down a bit before getting started. For the most part, at least from what I’ve seen on social media, people seem to like the new set of features that version 5 offers.