ANSYS ALinks for EDA

Integrate Electrical CAD (ECAD) to ANSYS Software

ANSYS ALinks for EDA (once called AnsoftLinks for ECAD) streamlines the transfer of design databases from popular third-party EDA layout tools into ANSYS electromagnetic, thermal and mechanical simulation products. EDA links are available for a number of tools offered by Altium, Cadence, Mentor Graphics, Sigrity and Zuken.

ALinks for EDA is critical for applications in which design automation is necessary to bring together electromagnetic, mechanical and fluid analyses with automated design entry. With ALinks, selected components in your IC, electronic package or printed circuit board design can be automatically translated and converted into ready-to-simulate models, freeing you from time-consuming and error-prone design re-entry.

 

What's New in ANSYS Alinks for EDA

  • New name: ANSYS ALinks is the former AnsoftLinks for ECAD.
  • New interface : ALinks for EDA uses the popular ANSYS SIwave user interface with EDA-specific features.
ALinks provides the ability to view selected nets within complex ECAD geometries, giving you visual aid on complicated designs.

 

Merging of BGA electrical package onto PCB using automated merging capabilities found within ALinks for EDA

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GUI Ease of Use GUI Ease of Use

Undo/redo

Recent project history

Net selection ease of use

  • Show only highlighted nets
  • Automated differential net identification
  • Automated extended net (ENET) identification
  • Automated pwr/gnd identification identification
    • Net properties
      • Net properties by hovering cursor
      • Net filtering
      • Detect close edges
      • Measure
      • Check net length
      • Calculate electrical properties (R, L, C, G, delay, Zo …)
      • Change trace width
      Color mode
      • Color by layer
      • Color by net
      • Control highlighting color
      • Control background color
      • Control lighting
      Interactive options
      • Dynamic zoom or fast zoom
      • Hot keys (standard Ansoft ALT/SHIFT/LMB commands)
      • Z stretch
      • LMB pan, roller zoom
      • View cross section
      Drawing capabilities
      • Resize planes
      • Standard primitives such as circle, trace, polygon
      • Create IC die networks
      Find components 
    • Cap library browser

3-D Export 3-D Export

  • Speedup during solid model creation

    64 bit

    Plane extents

      • Create plane extent default size
      • Ability to preview plane extent
      • Draw polygon and rectangular plane extents

    3-D export

    • Preview clipped design
    • Save default export options 
    • Export to ANSYS HFSS 
    • Export to ANSDYS Q3D Extractor
    • Export to ANSYS Workbench

    Geometry validation prior to export

    Automated package import

      • Multiple package import to top and bottom layers

ECAD Handling ECAD Handling

      • Stackup editor with export/import
  • Surface roughness setup
  • Trapezoidal etching
  • Signal net dielectric fill definitions
  • Frequency-dependent dielectric materials
  • Material database

Padstack editor

  • Ability to merge build up vias from package designs
  • Via plating (solid, absolute or plating percentage)
  • Polygon, oval, circular, square …

Bondwires

  • Support for multiple bondwire types on a single layer
  • Drawing utility for bondwires

Solderball and solderbump simplified setup

  • .mdl import

ODB++ support improvements

  • Automatic component import for Mentor Expedition EE7.9.2
  • Automatic stackup import for Mentor Expedition EE7.9.4
  • ODB++ component import managerAbility to merge build up vias from package designs

Cadence material import

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