> It's very hard to solder such a complex double sided board without > through-plated holes and soldermask.
Not really, once you know how. The trick for ICs is to just blob-solder them on (i.e. worry about good connections, not about shorts) then hit it with the copper desoldering braid to remove the excess and the shorts. It's fast, reliable, and clean. For the smallest parts, you won't get a solder mask between pins anyway, with most prototype-level fabs. It probably wouldn't help even if you could; the solder would just jump across the tiny gap. _______________________________________________ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user