QUICK START GUIDE

Getting Started With PSpice

 Getting Started With PSpice

Contents
Introducing PSpice.............................................................................4
Creating a Project......................................................................4
Building a Circuit........................................................................6
Editing Part Properties............................................................9
Connecting Parts.....................................................................10
Simulating Your Circuit ...................................................................11
Setting Up a Simulation Profile.............................................11
Evaluating Circuit Behavior Using Probes........................ 13
Changing Trace Properties and Adding New Plots.......14
Analyzing Results With Precise Measurements............. 16
Additional Resources...................................................................... 17

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 Getting Started With PSpice

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 Getting Started With PSpice

Introducing PSpice
PSpice is a simulation software used for analog and mixed-signal electronic circuit design and analysis. It helps you predict
how circuits behave before they are physically built, so you can efficiently test and optimize your designs.
In this guide, we will explore the basics of PSpice, guiding you through its essential features, from creating a simple
schematic to running and analyzing a simulation.
Here’s how you can get started:
Find Capture CIS from the Windows Start menu by doing the following:

1. Choose Start – All Programs – Cadence PCB <release year> - Capture CIS <release version>, and select a product license.
(example – release year: 2024, release version: 24.1)

2. You will be greeted with a Login window, where you can sign in or create an account to access the shared OrCAD X
OnCloud workspace. If you’re not going to be using the shared workspace for now, just click on the X to close the window.

Creating a Project
3. Now select File – New – Project from the main toolbar menu.

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4. Within the New Project window, enter a name for your project (example name: Demo) in the Name field.

a. If you intend to include simulation capabilities in your PCB design, select the Enable PSpice Simulation check box. In
the Location field, you can specify the path where you want the new project files to be saved or use the Browse button
to locate the directory.

b. If you intend to store your project in the OrCAD X Cloud workspace so that it’s easily sharable, select the Use
Workspace check box. The Location field will display the pre-seeded workspace path, which cannot be edited.
When you’re ready, click on OK.
Note: Do not use a period (.) in the name of your projects or designs.

5. Selecting the Enable PSpice Simulation checkbox opens up a Create PSpice Project window. From the two options, select
Create a blank project and click OK.

6. A new project is created, and a blank schematic page is displayed. Here’s a rundown of the workspace.
f #1 – Displays all folders and files associated with the project and their hierarchy
f #2 – Schematic area where you draw circuits
f #3 – Title block to list document information about the design
f #4 – Quick access toolbar menu to create, edit, and run simulations, along with probes and advanced analysis to observe
circuit simulation
f #5 – Quick access toolbar menu to edit your schematic

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 Getting Started With PSpice

Now, you can start placing parts and establishing connectivity using wires.

Building a Circuit
7. For this example, we will build a Rectifier Circuit. There are multiple ways to place parts, but the two common ways are
either selecting Place – Component or Place – PSpice Part from the main menu.

a. Selecting Place – Component will populate the screen as shown below, where you can select a category, whether
PSpice or a 3rd party vendor (SamacSys, Ultra Librarian, SnapMagic) and enter the name of a specific component into
the search bar. Double-clicking on the part allows you to place it directly on the schematic.

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 Getting Started With PSpice

b. Selecting Place – PSpice Part displays a list of options to place parts from, such as shown in the image below.

8. Selecting Place – PSpice Part – Modeling Application opens a new pane on the right-hand side. Expand the Sources
category and click to select Independent Sources.
Note: You may have to click on your schematic page to activate the pane.

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 Getting Started With PSpice

9. Within the Independent Sources window, select the Sine tab and leave the Voltage and Sine radio buttons that are selected
as is.

a. Enter the following values for the parameters as shown below – FREQ = 50, VAMPL = 2, and VOFF = 1, AC = 0, and click
Place.

The VSIN symbol is now attached to your mouse cursor. Move your cursor to the correct position on the schematic page and
click to place the part.

10. Either press Escape (Esc) on your keyboard or right-click and select End Mode to avoid placing the part again.

11. Next, place the rest of the parts needed by clicking on Place – PSpice Part. Select Diode, Resistor, Capacitor, and Ground.
For each part, move the cursor to the correct position on the schematic page, rotate if necessary, click to place, and press
Escape.

Note: To rotate the part so the arrows are pointing in the correct direction, press R one or more times to rotate the part to the
desired orientation. If you need to rotate the part after it has been placed, just select it and press R.

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 Getting Started With PSpice

Editing Part Properties

12. The parts are placed on the page as shown below. Next, change the values of capacitor C1 and resistor R1 by double-
clicking on their respective values (1n and 1k).

13. A Display Properties window appears, as shown below. Change the number in the Value field (C1 = 1uF and R1 = 10k) and
click OK.

14. To edit a part’s properties, either double-click on the part or select the part and right-click – Edit Properties to open the
Property Editor. See the example image below.

a. Click on Pivot to change how the spreadsheet is displayed (column or row format).

b. New Property allows you to add a new property to the part.

c. The table below is where you can edit your parameters if necessary.

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 Getting Started With PSpice

Note: When editing part parameters via the Property Editor, make sure to click on Apply, then close the Property Editor
window.

Connecting Parts
15. Next, connect these parts using wires. From the Place menu, choose Wire (keyboard shortcut: W) to begin wiring parts or
select it from the toolbar ( ).

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16. The pointer changes to a crosshair. Click on the connection point ( + pin of V1). Click the nearest connection point of the
input diode D1 and continue to finish the rest of the connections. To stop wiring, right-click and choose End Wire or press
Escape. The pointer changes to the default arrow, and clicking on any valid connection point ends a wire.

17. .Complete the circuit connections so that final circuit looks like as shown below. Then click on File – Save or use the
keyboard shortcut Ctrl+S to save your schematic.

The next section will describe how you can simulate your circuit using PSpice and analyze the results.

Simulating Your Circuit

Setting Up a Simulation Profile
1. From the top toolbar menu, choose New Simulation Profile ( ). It displays the New Simulation window as shown below:

2. In the Name text field, type Transient. Leave the Inherit From list as none, then click Create. If a license selection window
pops up, select one of the available PSpice licenses. Let’s select PSpice A/D and click OK.
Note: If you would like to inherit simulation settings from a previous project, use the browse button (…) to locate the .sim file.

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 Getting Started With PSpice

3. The Simulation Settings window appears as shown below:

4. Set the following parameters for the transient analysis simulation: Run To Time = 50 m, Maximum Step Size = 0.1m, and
click on Apply and OK.

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 Getting Started With PSpice

Evaluating Circuit Behavior Using Probes

Note: It is important to place voltage, current or power probes ( ) on your circuit before simulating as they act
as measurement points, allowing PSpice to capture and display waveforms associated at those nodes.

5. Add a voltage probe to your circuit to see the voltage level across the resistor as shown below:

6. From the toolbar menu, choose Run ( ). PSpice simulates the circuit and calculates the time domain information.

7. If there are no connection errors in your schematic, the session log at the bottom will let you know if the PSpice netlist was
generated.

8. Once the simulation is completed, the following voltage waveform will be displayed as shown below:

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 Getting Started With PSpice

Changing Trace Properties and Adding New Plots

9. To change the color, pattern, width, or symbol, right-click on the waveform and select Trace Property from the menu.

10. Change the color of the trace to blue and the width to the 4th option as shown below in the Trace Properties window:

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 Getting Started With PSpice

11. If you want to check the current going through the diode, you can either add a current probe ( ) at the positive node of
the diode on the circuit or right-click on the simulation graph and click on Add Plot. You will see a new plot appear in the
simulation window, as shown below:

12. On the empty plot, right-click and select Add Trace from the menu. An Add Traces window appears, as shown below,
where you can enter a trace expression. Select I(D1) from under the Simulation Output Variables list and click OK.

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 Getting Started With PSpice

13. You can now see the waveforms for both the current and voltage of your rectifier circuit.

a. Follow steps 9 – 10 above to change the trace properties of I(D1) and modify its color (yellow) and width.

Analyzing Results With Precise Measurements

14. To check the ripple voltage of the circuit after a transient simulation run, click on Toggle Cursor from the toolbar menu.
Then, select the square symbol next to the V(R1:2) trace expression at the bottom of the plot so that the cursor is active on
the correct plot window.

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 Getting Started With PSpice

15. Place the probe cursors by left-clicking and right-clicking on the voltage plot. Left-click to drag the first probe cursor to
the peak at around 5ms, this is measuring the maximum voltage, and right-click to pull up a second probe cursor to
measure the trough at around 20.5ms, which measures the minimum voltage.

16. The measured peak and trough values and the difference between them are displayed within the table in the Probe Cursor
window, as shown below, helping you measure the ripple voltage of your circuit.

Additional Resources
For more resources on PSpice, visit the following links on our Cadence PCB Resources Hub:
f Blogs
f Videos
f Application Notes

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