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Comment by estimator7292 | Hacker News Reader

I've been an EE for a decade and I made this exact mistake last week. It's inevitable lol

You can catch it with a footprint review. List all your new footprints or old footprints assigned to new parts, and have someone else check them against the datasheets. Or if you ever have the good fortune to work with a very good layout designer, they will check things like that for you just to catch you out.

I've seen such things pass through multiple layers of review. It's the kind of thing everyone knows to look for but takes a lot of effort to catch.

"Can" does not mean "always will without fail". On the flip side, you will never catch things in review if you don't review.

Having a specific review for new parts helps to keep footprint errors from "passing through". I've never seen a general layout review catch a footprint error: if you're used to using internal library parts, no one thinks to check them.

I haven't managed to design a pcb without finding an issue in the first run.

Shoutout to OSHpark's prototype service. Something like 5 bucks an inch and you only have to toss out 3 if you find a fault.

Write a list of everything that you fuck up every time, check the next one against it and eventually you get a good one first hit. I had three in a row that worked out of the box in the end!

Printing the board outline and layers combined as well. And checking you used the correct footprints against actual parts helps.

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