Experience I've been in the 3D/2D CAD industry for 10 yrs. & also had the opportunity/exposure to operate with several mainstream design packages. I've assisted many firms facilitate their 3D migration process.
Question I'm looking for a "system" CAD program that will do the following- I have a rack, two chassis and 3 PC boards. These parts are individual drawings that also appear in a "library" in the CAD program. From a new drawing, I drag in the rack, then drag in the chassis, locate them in the rack then drag in 2 pc bds into one of the chassis, and the last pc board into the other chassis. Now comes the tough part, I call it "layering". If I click on the rack I see what's in the rack (2 chassis. If I click one of the chassis, I see the PC bd(s). Clicking any of these gives me more details.
Does any CAD package come close to my needs??
Thanks
Answer Paul, just about all the mainstream 3D CAD packages can do this (Solidworks, Inventor, Mechanical Desktop, etc.). However, these are mechanical packages. They won't be as user friendly for modeling & editing your circuit boards. What is your design intent? Are you just trying to illustrate & crate BOM?