Hi, Ive heard of this simulator thing called spice, is it any good? is it free?
You can get free versions and yes it is good. In fact, it would probably be most engineers most useful tool. The linear technology version is getting quite good these days, check it out at http://www.linear.com/ Spice can be quite difficult to use, but once you master it you will never look back.
Some are free others are not. Ltspice http://www.linear.com/software/ free also get a copy of electronics workbench or the demo. aplac is okay as well. For cad software get a copy of eagle from www.cadsoft.de be sure to download the manual and other docs as well. Alex