Calculator recommendation?

[fpga]

Well, I don't like RPN... I have an old HP RPN calculator from early 1980's.

RPN is addictive. Once you get use to it, there's no going back!

[AndrejaKo]

It's sad to see how little love HP-50g got in this thread. I've been using it since 2007 (I think) and I like it very much.  At first, I couldn't even image doing any graphs on it, but doing them turned out to be easier  and more convenient than re-learning Matlab and more capable than what Wolfram Alpha offers at the moment. Too bad that its serial port uses that strange connector type.

Another thing that had major effect on how I use calculators was my laptop. It has a button next to the numpad which was originally meant to launch some stupid multimedia program. Fortunately it's programmable, so I set it to launch windows calculator instead. That single thing made me actually use the windows calculator in the first place. Now I just press the button and it comes up, as quickly as it takes me to get a dumb calculator to turn on.

[Aeon]

after I destroyed 3 TI-Calculators which we got in School I bought a Casio fx-991MS That was somewhere around 1999/2000. i still have it. it brought me nice through School and through University.

The nice thing about the MS-Version is you can input the shortcuts: k for 10^3, M for 10^6 or m for 10^-3 and so on. As Engineer I use that feature a lot.
picture: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Casio_fx-991MS_scientific_calculator_1aa.jpg

The successor the fx-991ES is missing this feature, like displaying the inputet forumlas in a nice way.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Casio_fx-991ES_Calculator_New.jpg

[Telequipment]

 I got a calculator Casio scientific " Great" now all I need is some one to show me how to turn it on, then how to use it, my 12 & 14 Year old daughters use them but haven't got the patience to show me, are you crying out there yet .  I did find my old one they hid on me, so not all is lost.

[AndyC_772]

The successor the fx-991ES is missing this feature

You could try the FX-115MS as I did - they're virtually identical. I have one of each.

[rsjsouza]

It's sad to see how little love HP-50g got in this thread. I've been using it since 2007 (I think) and I like it very much. 

Maybe this is because the original poster mentioned aversion to RPN. In any case, thanks for your comments regarding the 50G; I have a 48G and now I can rest assured to get a nice replacement when it dies.

[NerdCore]

I bought my fiancé a TI-84+ Silver edition back in 2005 when she started college. I am now using it (8 years later) and will be using it for the next decade (until I finish my masters). I have no complaints and it does everything I want it to. It doesn't have the glam color LCD or any toys inside it. But it's a calculator not a tablet. I want it to make computations not be able to play snake. For the money I paid for it and the longevity I have already gotten out of it. If this one were to fail today, I would buy another without thinking or looking at anything else.

[AndrejaKo]

It's sad to see how little love HP-50g got in this thread. I've been using it since 2007 (I think) and I like it very much. 

Maybe this is because the original poster mentioned aversion to RPN. In any case, thanks for your comments regarding the 50G; I have a 48G and now I can rest assured to get a nice replacement when it dies.

I'm not sure if people here are aware, but Hp-50g works just fine in modes other than RPN. Just because it has that feature, it doesn't mean that it must be always used. In fact it comes in algebraic mode by default. I remember back when I got it that HP fans considered that a heresy. Relevant link: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?objectID=c01766748&lang=en&cc=us&taskId=101&contentType=SupportFAQ&prodSeriesId=3235173

Anyway, it took me whole 5 minutes to start working with RPN and now I'm looking for a dumb HP calculator with RPN to use on tests. The Casio fx-911ES is quite painful to use., after getting used to RPN

[Zad]

Can you imagine the day a new engineer walks into his new job, opens his briefcase and fetches out that?

If you are calculating, use a calculator. If you are data processing, use a computer.

[c4757p]

That is a clunky computer shoehorned into a calculator enclosure designed simply to make school administrators with too much money write a check for the next big thing. Its functionality that goes beyond that of a normal calculator is too useless and wanky to be of use to a real engineer, and will only serve to give students more shortcuts so we can ensure they never learn anything at all. Its functionality that does not go beyond that of a normal calculator is too much of a pain to get to through the wank features and too expensive. Yet another failure from the TI calculator people.

[nctnico]

Perhaps but when the going gets though I rather use Excel on a >20" monitor than a small calculator screen. And I suppose there are apps for Android (et al) to turn you phone into a scientific calculator.

[rsjsouza]

That is a clunky computer shoehorned into a calculator enclosure...

I am with ErikTheNorwegian on this one; I recall some teachers raged by the fact we had HP 28s and 48s with all its capabilities back in early 90's, and accused us of the same things you mentioned...

Power to the calculators!

[c4757p]

I am with ErikTheNorwegian on this one; I recall some teachers raged by the fact we had HP 28s and 48s with all its capabilities back in early 90's, and accused us of the same things you mentioned...

We had TI-83 and TI-84 when I was in high school and I assure you, they presented a wonderful roadblock to students actually learning. Nobody would understand a damn thing that they couldn't figure out how to enter into the calculator. Most of the students in my class would have needed to have a go at plotting something containing e^x before they could tell you its curve would be exponential. Numeric intuition was nonexistent. They could hardly imagine the order of magnitude of a simple multiplication without fully computing it and counting the digits. And I don't want to even guess at the amount of time that was wasted trying to teach people how to use them...

I can't imagine how much worse it would be if they had HP-48s. Those can even solve their equations for them!

[Fsck]

if I remember correctly, the nspires can do (linear only?) diff eqns as well

[c4757p]

Oh good grief. Is there anything left for the students to do?

[nanofrog]

I think you se the students as more stupid than they realy are..   
At all the schools i have bee to, we learnd how to solve everything manualy and understand it well before we are let loos with a calculator of any kind..

Might have to do with the differences of how things are taught though. 

For example, students in one nation may only be memorizing button sequences, so are lost on the fundamentals, while those in another learn the fundamentals, then use the calculators to help improve their understanding.

Just a thought. 

[nctnico]

Oh good grief. Is there anything left for the students to do?

Fortunately real world math problems go further than just filling in some numbers. The most recent major math problem I had to solve has cost me a ball-point pen and close to 50 sheets of A4 paper. Math software couldn't crunch that problem either... In the end it took insight and a hands on approach which works excellent.

[c4757p]

I think you se the students as more stupid than they realy are..   

Nah.... I'd be the same way if I allowed myself to use things like that. They're not stupid, they just don't want to waste their time, and don't really see why they should.

The fear of the Ti Nspire is allways from people who hast used one.. if you dont like it, others may well do.

Read all the customer reviews here..

Oh, of course there are people who like it. Everybody who needs has a different opinion on what kind of calculator is best; my opinion is that they're shit and useless, but people are going to disagree. I still stand by my criticism that they're bad for school use.

Oh good grief. Is there anything left for the students to do?

Fortunately real world math problems go further than just filling in some numbers. The most recent major math problem I had to solve has cost me a ball-point pen and close to 50 sheets of A4 paper. Math software couldn't crunch that problem either... In the end it took insight and a hands on approach which works excellent.

Right, and since the math problems in school so frequently do not, the students will be entirely unprepared.

[rsjsouza]

For example, students in one nation may only be memorizing button sequences, so are lost on the fundamentals, while those in another learn the fundamentals, then use the calculators to help improve their understanding.

Yes, it probably is, and for that I agree with c4757p - I somehow was thinking we were talking about university students, but then I realized the education system here in the US is different.

Back in Brazil up to high school (inclusive) no calculators could be used in any tests, and this forced us to do math by hand. At the university some teachers quickly realized the capabilities of advanced calculators and had a normal apprehension over the learning experience - one of them even disallowed "alphanumeric calculators"... Over time me and my colleagues showed the teachers this was really a wonderful helper for day-to-day activities (we programmed EE solvers of several types, Bode plots, root locus graphs, etc.)

When I was growing up we had a type of calculator that required you to insert the entire expression and gave just a right/wrong answer (green/red LED) and it was really fun to play with. Its name was "professor dismaquinho".

[c4757p]

I somehow was thinking we were talking about university students, but then I realized the education system here in the US is different.

I didn't even think to clarify! Yes, I mean for high school (or whatever else it's called around the world) students. University is different.

[c4757p]

I think you se the students as more stupid than they realy are..   

Nah.... I'd be the same way if I allowed myself to use things like that.

So , you say you stand abov and are better than all the studenst in USA?

No, but I have retained more knowledge of what we were taught than many of us by paying attention in class instead of dicking around with my calculator. If that's arrogant, so be it.

[ErikTheNorwegian]

I think you se the students as more stupid than they realy are..   

Nah.... I'd be the same way if I allowed myself to use things like that.

So , you say you stand abov and are better than all the studenst in USA?

No, but I have retained more knowledge of what we were taught than many of us by paying attention in class instead of dicking around with my calculator. If that's arrogant, so be it.

So, its not the calculators fault, but the dicking around of the students.. well, we are closing in on the problem here.   

[c4757p]

No, everyone's going to dick around if you let them. (And no, I'm not saying I wouldn't. I sure as hell did. I only paid more attention to math because I found it interesting, and no, that did not extend to classes I found just as tedious as everyone else.) So don't give them little computers.

[ErikTheNorwegian]

No, everyone's going to dick around if you let them. (And no, I'm not saying I wouldn't. I sure as hell did. I only paid more attention to math because I found it interesting, and no, that did not extend to classes I found just as tedious as everyone else.) So don't give them little computers.

So the students have to learn to use calculators after they have graduated,and are ready to start to work?

[rsjsouza]

So don't give them little computers.

iPhones you mean?

In my opinion the parents' education is way more important than the ubiquity of tools... Unfortunately the number of distractions will only increase over time and only the kids that are taught to use their brains before "crutches" will get more out of school - obviously that others are self-driven, but I have the impression this is not as common. But I digress.