[BC] The subject of old reliable HP calculators

[Robert Orban]

At 06:23 AM 10/6/2007, Jeff Glass wrote:

>I had, and disposed of, an HP-48. I could not figure out how to program the
>thing. There were dozens of extra key presses that were required to activate
>advanced features. I would not call  the learning curve steep, but more of a
>vertical line :-) I've written programs in assembler, FORTRAN, C and 
>Visual Basic
>for the PC, but could never get my hands around the 48. Bought all the books,
>but got nowhere with the thing. Had an HP-41 emulator for it too that I used
>a lot. I had a sudden attack of brilliance and realized, why screw around with
>the 48 with the 41 emulator when I could just use the 41? Duh! Maybe I'm just
>too old.

Before I bought the 35s, II bought a 50g (which is the current 
version of the 48) and I agree with you. But except for *very* 
special applications where even a light Windows notebook is too big, 
I don't see much value in an advanced programmable calculator these 
days. When you can write Fortran or Visual Basic programs (or 
virtually any other language, for that matter) on a 3-pound 
battery-operated laptop with a much bigger screen than the 
calculator, programming the calculator or using it for computer 
algebra just seems masochistic. I use the calculator mostly for quick 
and dirty expression evaluation or financial calculations; I do 
programming and computer algebra on Windows machines.

The 50g's store and recall functions are oblique compared to the 
older, simpler HP calculators and the 50g is not particularly 
intuitive to operate. (Entering complex numbers will force virtually 
anyone back to the manual if they haven't done it in awhile.) 
However, its build quality and keyboard feel are greatly improved 
compared to the 49g and it's nice to be able to see all the entries 
of a 8-level stack in the display simultaneously.


>I really would like to hear some good suggestions for a 21st century version
>of the HP-41. I don't want something that does a whole bunch of other
>unrelated junk; just a nice RPN programmable scientific calculator 
>with all the trig
>and other functions that preferably, would allow download and upload to my PC.

If you didn't like the 48, then the 35s is really your only other 
serious choice in an RPN calculator that you can buy new. (The 33s 
was widely despised as being flimsy and having a bad keyboard.) The 
35s is programmable, although you have to key in the programs 
manually (it has no USB or optical communications, unlike the 50g). 
Once keyed in, the programs should remain in the calculator 
indefinitely, even when you change the batteries. HP has a lot of 
info (including the manual and a bunch of application notes) on its 
website. The 35s's handling of complex numbers and store/recall is 
much more intuitive than the 50's handing of these operations; the 
35s has a dedicated "i" key to enter the imaginary part of a complex 
number and a dedicated RCL key. Unfortunately, the STO function no 
longer has a dedicated key (like many older HP caclulators); it 
requires two keystrokes.

Bob Orban