Author Topic: What's your favorite calculator?  (Read 18962 times)

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Offline py-bb

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #100 on: October 22, 2022, 02:10:40 pm »
I got a TI NSpire CAS thinking "ooh 250mb of RAM (or something)" and "ooh 700mhz arm processor"

It's shit, it's so educational style that on the box it is like "you can move equations" and shows y=x^2 being turned into y=(x-c)^2 for translation - only works on x^2 - the CAS takes forever on practical things, the graphs are slow as hell to plot, terrible thing.


Love my Casio FX 9860 GII

It has an SD card, a backlight, you can overclock it which is nice and I replace the 4xAAAs (which are rechargeable) like once every 2 years, it's amazing how long they've lasted.

It's a nice little "math shell" in how you can press up and re-run stuff, had it since sixth form, love it.

 

Offline bingo600

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #101 on: October 22, 2022, 07:43:25 pm »
Back in my 6800/6809 ASm days , I loved this one
http://www.datamath.org/Sci/Slanted/Programmer-II.htm



I still have it , and it's working  :)
Got it exchanged via TI , from a Programmer to a Programmer II - The previous had the "ugly TI key-prell"

/Bingo
« Last Edit: October 22, 2022, 07:45:19 pm by bingo600 »
 

Online Benta

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #102 on: October 22, 2022, 10:09:30 pm »
The TI calculators always had lousy keys.
Press "5" and you'd get "555". Miserable quality, That's where the HPs shone.
 
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Offline rdl

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #103 on: October 22, 2022, 10:21:14 pm »
I have the older version of the TI Programmer. It has the little red bubble LEDs. I bought it during my quest to find a calculator with light up digits.
 

Offline rsjsouza

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #104 on: October 22, 2022, 11:45:14 pm »
The TI calculators always had lousy keys.
Press "5" and you'd get "555". Miserable quality, That's where the HPs shone.
The TI57/58/59 had excellent keys -  I was quite a power user back when I was a kid programming my dad's calculator.
Vbe - vídeo blog eletrônico http://videos.vbeletronico.com

Oh, the "whys" of the datasheets... The information is there not to be an axiomatic truth, but instead each speck of data must be slowly inhaled while carefully performing a deep search inside oneself to find the true metaphysical sense...
 

Offline rsjsouza

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #105 on: October 22, 2022, 11:47:28 pm »
I have the older version of the TI Programmer. It has the little red bubble LEDs. I bought it during my quest to find a calculator with light up digits.
I also have this calculator and love it. The red display brings me back to my childhood and my dad's TI59
Vbe - vídeo blog eletrônico http://videos.vbeletronico.com

Oh, the "whys" of the datasheets... The information is there not to be an axiomatic truth, but instead each speck of data must be slowly inhaled while carefully performing a deep search inside oneself to find the true metaphysical sense...
 

Offline rsjsouza

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #106 on: October 22, 2022, 11:52:43 pm »
AC powered, Nixie tubes, fixed-point arithmetic, memory, 52 years old and going strong.  My favorite.
Beautiful model you have there. I have a nixie calculator as well (Casio AS-A), but unfortunately it is a very early model that is quite unreliable and mine works well for a few minutes before the results start going cuckoo. I still need to work on it, but the -24V MOS logic is quite difficult to get right with these cheapie logic analyzers.

My page where I have several photos of it:
https://sites.google.com/view/vbeletronico/casio-as-a-vbe-014
Vbe - vídeo blog eletrônico http://videos.vbeletronico.com

Oh, the "whys" of the datasheets... The information is there not to be an axiomatic truth, but instead each speck of data must be slowly inhaled while carefully performing a deep search inside oneself to find the true metaphysical sense...
 
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Offline David Hess

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #107 on: October 23, 2022, 12:49:04 am »
I refurbished the battery pack for an NOS (new old stock) TI-55 a couple weeks ago and found something weird.

When I originally fixed the battery pack, I tested it with the calculator and the calculator was broken.  It had never occurred to me that an NOS TI-55 would not work.  Further testing with a power supply confirmed it.

So I found a couple of junked TI-55s on Ebay and planned on replacing the processor/display board.  When the Ebay units arrived, I tested them on my power supply and they worked fine.  Then I wondered what the current draw was so I swapped test leads and ... now neither of the two TI-55s from Ebay worked.  What the hell?  I checked the test leads and they were connected correctly, so that did not make any sense, but then I noticed that the other test leads were backwards.

So I connected power backwards to the NOS TI-55 and it worked fine.  What happened is that Texas Instruments manufactured them with the red lead as negative and the black lead as positive.
 
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Offline rsjsouza

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #108 on: October 23, 2022, 01:27:47 am »
This is plain evil... I put this as evil as the negative center tip on power barrel jacks of japanese musical instruments.
Vbe - vídeo blog eletrônico http://videos.vbeletronico.com

Oh, the "whys" of the datasheets... The information is there not to be an axiomatic truth, but instead each speck of data must be slowly inhaled while carefully performing a deep search inside oneself to find the true metaphysical sense...
 

Offline eti

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #109 on: October 23, 2022, 02:08:02 am »
The one GOD gave me, in me noggin  ;)
 

Offline armandine2

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #110 on: October 23, 2022, 11:11:33 am »
my TI59 - needs a battery pack - which I never had as it was on a printer.
In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught - Hunter S Thompson
 
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Offline David Hess

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #111 on: October 23, 2022, 01:18:39 pm »
This is plain evil... I put this as evil as the negative center tip on power barrel jacks of japanese musical instruments.

There is actually a good justification for center tip negative.  It allows the built in switch to disconnect positive in a negative ground system, so ground remains connected and ground is connected first.

 
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Offline artag

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #112 on: October 23, 2022, 03:59:05 pm »
I have a selection of HP calculators and like them all, especially the 'Voyager' hp1xC series, but if I had to keep only one it would be the one I bought new - the HP16C.

I probably use the 32SII more often though, as the 16C doesn't have trig functions and the integer features of the 32SII are just about sufficient for most needs.

Non-hp / non-RPN calculators don't really compare. I just keep them as curiosities. But I like the keyboards of older Canons - Canola and Palmtronic with Nixie, VFD and LED displays. I'd really like to get another Palmtronic F5 like the one I owned nearly 50 years ago.
« Last Edit: October 23, 2022, 04:16:28 pm by artag »
 

Offline Calambres

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #113 on: October 23, 2022, 04:14:43 pm »
This is plain evil... I put this as evil as the negative center tip on power barrel jacks of japanese musical instruments.

There is actually a good justification for center tip negative.  It allows the built in switch to disconnect positive in a negative ground system, so ground remains connected and ground is connected first.
There's even a better rationale for that: it disconnects the positive side of the included 9V battery clip so it is irrelevant whether it is left without a battery connected, bouncing inside a metallic negative ground chassis.

Offline artag

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #114 on: October 23, 2022, 04:18:10 pm »
The one GOD gave me, in me noggin  ;)

I've got one of those but it's just not reliable for more than a couple of digits.
 

Offline rsjsouza

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #115 on: October 23, 2022, 05:19:46 pm »
This is plain evil... I put this as evil as the negative center tip on power barrel jacks of japanese musical instruments.

There is actually a good justification for center tip negative.  It allows the built in switch to disconnect positive in a negative ground system, so ground remains connected and ground is connected first.
IME 100% of such adapters I saw were fully isolated (linear power supplies), therefore disconnecting ground or positive makes zero difference in the greater scheme of things. Also, the disconnect can vary with the quality of modern variants of barrel plugs - I got various models that vary their disconnect pattern - sure, the vast majority of them connect the center first, but I have seen some that don't. To me it makes zero difference, only an annoyance that is prone to bring yet another crap variable to the already confusing world of barrel jacks and plugs with various voltages but with the same dimensions.
Vbe - vídeo blog eletrônico http://videos.vbeletronico.com

Oh, the "whys" of the datasheets... The information is there not to be an axiomatic truth, but instead each speck of data must be slowly inhaled while carefully performing a deep search inside oneself to find the true metaphysical sense...
 

Offline David Hess

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #116 on: October 24, 2022, 03:07:52 pm »
This is plain evil... I put this as evil as the negative center tip on power barrel jacks of japanese musical instruments.

There is actually a good justification for center tip negative.  It allows the built in switch to disconnect positive in a negative ground system, so ground remains connected and ground is connected first.

IME 100% of such adapters I saw were fully isolated (linear power supplies), therefore disconnecting ground or positive makes zero difference in the greater scheme of things. Also, the disconnect can vary with the quality of modern variants of barrel plugs - I got various models that vary their disconnect pattern - sure, the vast majority of them connect the center first, but I have seen some that don't. To me it makes zero difference, only an annoyance that is prone to bring yet another crap variable to the already confusing world of barrel jacks and plugs with various voltages but with the same dimensions.

But it gives the option, or at least makes it easier, to power something from a non-isolated DC source.
« Last Edit: October 28, 2022, 10:55:13 pm by David Hess »
 

Offline onsenwombat

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #117 on: October 28, 2022, 09:02:45 am »
TI-85 any day, every day.
 

Offline Picuino

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #118 on: October 28, 2022, 10:51:38 am »
With the Zilog Z80 at its heart.
What a great microprocessor!

 

Offline DiTBho

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #119 on: October 28, 2022, 02:57:36 pm »
Casio fx7500G  ;D
The opposite of courage is not cowardice, it is conformity. Even a dead fish can go with the flow
 

Offline jrmymllr

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #120 on: October 28, 2022, 03:12:52 pm »
I have an original TI-89 I ordered from an educational supply company 25 years ago using my Motorola bag phone. It got me through my engineering degree and I always found new things it could do.

And I think it's pretty cool that it uses a 68K CPU  ;D
 
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Offline tooki

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #121 on: October 28, 2022, 07:58:41 pm »
TI-85 any day, every day.
The TI-85 was my first graphing calculator. We were required to get one at school. After a year or so, I got a TI-86 and sold the TI-85. (First and foremost because of the TI-86’s much better display.) Alas, I don’t know what happened to the TI-86. On my last big move, I must have sold it, lost it, or given it away.

With that said, I absolutely love my HP Prime.
 

Offline Sal Ammoniac

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #122 on: October 28, 2022, 09:34:34 pm »
How are the keys on the HP Prime? As good as the ones on the HP-67 and HP-41?
"That's not even wrong" -- Wolfgang Pauli
 

Online iMo

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #123 on: October 28, 2022, 09:54:11 pm »
My favorite one is HP-25, I bought it 20y back on local flee market for 8Euro in perfect condition, replaced batteries for the modern nimh ones, and since then I fire up the gadget often and try to learn RPN finally (playing lunar landing), while watching its beautiful display, especially at night. The buttons are still working fine, best one ever made. Otherwise I own HP-48GX and WP-34S, but those are just gathering dust as they do not lit at night, and are too complex to use..  :D
« Last Edit: October 28, 2022, 10:10:29 pm by imo »
Readers discretion is advised..
 

Offline Howardlong

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Re: What's your favorite calculator?
« Reply #124 on: October 28, 2022, 11:28:35 pm »
How are the keys on the HP Prime? As good as the ones on the HP-67 and HP-41?

They're OK IME, although on the original version of the Prime, the contrast on the colouring of the keys made it almost impossible to use without good lighting.

As a calculator, it's interesting, but frankly if you're going to do anything outside of the classroom or exam room, you'd do it on a proper computer: the limitations of the non-qwerty keyboard interface and small screen are its biggest drawback for real, practical engineering purposes. The one exception to this is that I found it of some limited use on commuter train journeys where you often can't practically get a laptop out: I've done a fair bit of complex DSP modelling on the Prime at various times.

Like many non-trivial calculators, you really need to use it reasonably frequently to keep current and use it to its greatest capabilities.

I think that's why I'm still quite a fan of the specific Casio line FX-100D/115D/570xD/991D: they're just so very straightforward to use, offering immediate execution, and they persist the engineering display mode.

Although I have an FX-61F, I never found that I had much practical use for it, preferring the FX-100D etc mentioned above.

In recent years, I've found myself drifting over to RPN, and have become a bit of a fan boy of the HP Voyager series, although I find there displays are rather limiting compared to modern alternatives. The form factor is just my cup of tea though.

In practice, my daily drivers nowadays are either the WP-34S or the DM42: one I have with me at work, and the other at home.
« Last Edit: October 28, 2022, 11:32:11 pm by Howardlong »
 


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