Calculator for CS degree?

[BlinkY]

Strange question for an electronics forum but hey, ho. I'm sure Dave will forgive me, right?


Anyway, I'm due to start my computer science degree in September and it got me thinking about which calculator I may require. I recently upgraded my fx 83-es with a fx-85gt, could this be considered adequate?


I've browsed the web for some quick answers and they mostly point towards the TI-83 but then I read that some classes don't allow the use of graphing calculators?


Advice is welcome.

[bobdagangster]

Get a good scientific calculator that does complex numbers. Don't bother with a graphing calculator, as they are not permitted in most exams. Use a computer for more complicated stuff.
I just got myself a Casio fx-991es, and it does pretty much everything you need (complex numbers, simple matrices, simple integrals/derivatives, stats, physical constants, etc).

[sleemanj]

Anyway, I'm due to start my computer science degree in September and it got me thinking about which calculator I may require. I recently upgraded my fx 83-es with a fx-85gt, could this be considered adequate?

I did a Bsc in Comp Sci late nineties, I can't say I recall using a calculator that much, not for the Comp Sci courses anyway.  I only took first year discrete math, and stats to complete my maths quotient.

FWIW, my degree strucuture was made up of, Discrete Math 1st Year, Stats 1st Year, Psych 1st Year, Cognitive Psych 2nd Year which had lots of AI stuff in it, Philosophy 1st Year, Some second year philisophy course I forget the name of but which included things like incompleteness theorem and some AI considerations, and various 1st,2nd,3rd year comp sci courses. 

[Smokey]

Get a couple.  One basic one line display cheap scientific calc for the stuff they won't let you use the graphing calc on and a TI-89 Titanium or nspire.  Seriously those things solve symbolic differential equations + more.  Seriously. 

[Zad]

If it is anything like when I did my degree, the amount of calculator usage is less than A-level maths. Come to think of it, it is probably less than GCSE maths too. Any "proper" maths that you study will be symbolic and written out in full. It is the method you are learning, not the magical ability to come up with a number at the end of it. If you are doing some serious crunching, you will probably be using Matlab or similar anyway.

It would feel "wrong" to use a non-RPN system calculator now, and the HP-35s pretty much fits my real world calculator needs.

[IanB]

Calculators are toys and mostly inexpensive. Buy lots of them and decide which one(s) you like most.

You won't actually need to do many calculations in a CS degree. It's the engineers that get to play with all the numbers...

[c4757p]

If a calculator is beneficial to you in a CS program..... I don't think that's CS...

[perfect_disturbance]

Calculators are toys and mostly inexpensive. Buy lots of them and decide which one(s) you like most.

You won't actually need to do many calculations in a CS degree. It's the engineers that get to play with all the numbers...

Actually where I got my CS degree you finished 1 class short of a math minor.  I got to know my HP calculators (48g and 49g) very well.  And excluding linear algebra and some other specific stuff where calculators would have made it too easy we were allowed to use them on tests.

[c4757p]

Actually where I got my CS degree you finished 1 class short of a math minor.  I got to know my HP calculators (48g and 49g) very well.

Yep..... I know suggestions from fanboys aren't all that useful..... but if you do need more than a basic calculator, I will recommend these (or their more modern cousin, the 50g) enthusiastically.

[bbarbour]

As echoed above, you won't need a calculator for a CS degree (at least not for CS track courses).  If you do, then your CS program is antiquated.

What you will need a calculator for is the prerequisite math.  Often times Trigonometry and Statistics courses benefit from calculators like the TI-##.  At the college level, no instructor should care about advanced calculators.  For Calculus you'll possibly use something like Maple or Mathematica/Wolfram Alpha if you use a computer at all.  For Linear Algebra, again if you use a computer at all, you'll use Matlab/Octave.

As you advance in your CS studies, your work will very quickly go far, far beyond what a calculator can do (after all, that's what we have computers for!).

Since you are here... One of the smartest thing I did in my CS studies was take a few engineering courses.  You will never be an efficient software programmer if the hardware you are programming is a mystery.

[perfect_disturbance]

I don't think you'll need much of a calculator for your core classes but in the US at least most CS programs will require you take math (stats, calculus), hard science (physics or chemistry) and some engineering (my university required 2. Circuits and Architecture). I know some other countries don't have as much of a focus on giving undergraduates a liberal education. I attended 3 universities and at all 3 a student in a math, science, or engineering discipline that didn't have a graphing calculator of some type was an oddity.

[Rick Law]

....
Anyway, I'm due to start my computer science degree in September and it got me thinking about which calculator I may require. I recently upgraded my fx 83-es with a fx-85gt, could this be considered adequate?
....

BlinkY,

Look at the HP16C or similar.

It does Hex, Octo, Binary...  It can do math in integer or floating point - integer like a real microprocessor without a floating point co-processor would do.  It can do logic ops like AND, OR, XOR...

I think you will find that kind of calculator very useful.

Rick

[AG6QR]

BlinkY,

Look at the HP16C or similar.

It does Hex, Octo, Binary...  It can do math in integer or floating point - integer like a real microprocessor without a floating point co-processor would do.  It can do logic ops like AND, OR, XOR...

I think you will find that kind of calculator very useful.

I was going to suggest that, but you beat me to it.  Incredibly long battery life, great display, simple RPN.  You can program it to convert between hex and floating point, using virtually any floating point scheme.  It can be set to do integer arithmetic with any arbitrary word length, using ones complement, two's complement, or sign/magnitude, and it can display results in decimal, hex, octal, or binary.   Programmable with all the standard boolean algebra operations.  Only down side is that it doesn't have trig functions.  I bought mine in 1984 and it's still going strong.

There are several software emulators of the HP16C.  They lack the long battery life, great display, and solid keyboard, but are otherwise good.

But I'll also agree with those who suggest that a calculator isn't super-critical for CS work.  Even if you get the HP16C, you'll probably want a fairly standard engineering calculator to get through the math and other prerequisites.  And the HP16C functions can be done with the right software on a full-sized computer.  So while I think the HP16C is a great calculator for anyone doing programming at a low level, it's not absolutely essential.

[perfect_disturbance]

Here is what I recommend. Save 100 dollars(should be plenty for whatever) go to a computer science computer lab the first day and ask one of the lab assistants or TAs what you need. They should know. I'm pretty sure you'll need a graphing calculator but if not you can spend the rest on a $50 multi-meter.