I started doing PCBs in Altium Protel99SE some years ago. As I haven't used any oher s/w, I don't feel like suggesting you one. Drawing PCBs it's fairly easy if you have some electronic background.
Just adding up to the above rules:
- Contact the board manufacturer, to make sure you'll meet their manuf. specs (hole sizes, track width, etc.). Define and draw items with fixed positions first(connectors, screw holes, etc.) Start with subsystems first(supply, core processor, RF stage, etc.), arranging their parts and drawing tracks, then place these subcircuits in the main board area, then drawing the remaining tracks. Defined subcircuits help in debugging the prototype.
If you're working on multilayer PCBs, keep tracks on opposite layers perpendicular from each other, to minimize crosstalk. Avoid drawing long, straight tracks if you're expecting current pulses there, as this may act as antenna or RF stub. Draw thick fan-out tracks from VCC supply to subcircuits, and use a big GND plane for current return. This reduces high current loops and weird prototype behavior.
Try to use different GND planes for power supply, logic and analog/RF stages, to avoid noise from spreading through. Join them together with thick GND tracks far from noise-sensitive parts.
Minimize via usage, as they add inductance to RF tracks, while reducing effective conductive section if high currents are expected to get through. Vias are also common source of problems during board manufacturing, reflow soldering, etc. Add testpoints over tracks and vias whenever possible, marking the signal name, to help during debugging process.
Routing RF boards is a tricky business, more suited for artists. My little help would be: avoid sharp corners for RF tracks, as corners may act like radiating points at high freqs. Keep power tracks for RF stages as thick as possible, while pouring a wide GND plane around/below circuitry. There are loads of Internet resources to learn more about track impedance calculations. This would be valuable on creating printed antennas and sensitive tunable parts like filter coils, microwave capacitors, etc.
Good Luck!
