[Radio Wrangler]

Spice is a tool. You don't have to use it all the time and for everything, but it's valuable if you have it so you can use it when you hit appropriate problems.

The funny thing is that there are many people with no real understanding of circuits who put something into spice and muck around with values or re-connecting thing almost blindly hoping to get something to their taste. Spice is a tool for simulating things and telling you what you've got does. It's absolutely lousy at steering you which way to go if what you get isn't good. It doesn't have a function which tells you "This circuit is a piece of crap, why not try a ....."

It comes into its own when someone has a bit of a clue about what's going on.

It allows you to try ideas out without burning through your stocks of components or using up much of your life expectancy.

Like any tool, used in the right circumstances it helps, in the wrong circumstances it can make things worse.

Did you use an electric drill to make all those holes in that chassis, or did you use a hand-powered drill, and file them all larger? You've made a lot of holes in chassis in the time I've known you on the forum. On the other hand, consider a food mixer/processor. It does a two-minute job in 15 seconds, then takes 10 minutes to clean for the next job. They don't mention that part in the glossy adverts. Not all tools are good, but some are.

Spice is a useful tool. It can help your understanding of circuits, and you're at a phase where it really would help you.

David