In article .com,
says...
I'd like to thank you all for your input. Obviously, a process that
works and has high quality of results is much better than one that
merely looks good. I did research the sites of the people you mention.
I just wanted to be sure I understood the issues, and you've all
helped. Thank you.

Regards
Basil B.



Ugly is definitely in the eye of the beholder. If it bugs you, then
you might consider enclosing your modules in neat-looking Hammond boxes,
connecting them with exotic gold-plated SMA/SMB/SMC hardware. When the
lid is screwed down on the box, nobody can see the ugly stuff. I've
built (almost) an entire receiver this way:

http://www.speakeasy.net/~jmiles1/ke...x/equinox.html

Only the 1st LO synthesizer(s) are built on PC boards, and it wasn't
strictly necessary even in those cases. The prototype LO was built
ugly-style, and works just fine.

Perfboard can best be thought of as equivalent to conventional single-
sided PC boards, with no ground plane. As Roy pointed out, you often
don't care about stray capacitance as much as you care about having
ubiquitous access to a low-inductance ground. You don't get that with
either single-sided PC boards or perfboard.

Personally, I don't think much of the idea of fabbing a PC board for a
one-off project, unless it involves newfangled chips with more pins than
you can see. And perfboard, for me, is not the method of choice for
anything but digital work -- although people have certainly used it to
build some very nice gear.

-- jm

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