Calculators were the original handheld computers, but unlike the whole PDA fad, they've had amazing staying power through their 40-year history -- to this day, buttoned-up dudes crunching numbers at wooden desks have HP 12Cs next to them not for the kitschy retro street cred, but because they're functional, familiar, and do exactly what they're expected to do. Thing is, even purpose-suited perfection can only carry a product for so many years; eventually, raw technology and a new generation of users with different expectations are going to conspire to tear down the status quo. HP was the first giant to recognize that it might be a good idea to have virtual versions of its products available for a more modern medium, porting the 12C and 15C to the iPhone; now, TI -- HP's archrival in the calculator business for decades -- is doing the same by offering its BAII Plus as a $14.99 download from the App Store. That's exactly the same price as the 12C, so come on, you HP and TI diehards -- duke it out and tell us which brand makes the better adding machine once and for all, won't you?
posted Sep 25th 2009 9:11AM
I'm so horrible at math I need to use the Counting on Fingers app :/
You so silly.
Let's call it the iFinger app, shall we? It'll be used for more than Math.
+1 for creativity, Fx.Dr!
the only calculator I use on iPhone is "Loan U Later" for calculating mortgage rates and amortization. Its free on App Store.
The regular calculator is hard to use and I perfer a regular one.
This is awesome!. I use the BAII PLUS multiple times a day. One less thing on my desk.
Maybe for you, but it's useless for us university who wont be able to use it during a test.
I've owned dozens of calculators, attended 3 different colleges, and have 4 degrees, and I NEVER knew HP made calculators.
Same here two degrees in my case and it was Casio all the way!
By the way is this not duplicating functionality??
Are you kidding. HP makes some of the best calculator used in business and engineering. I would say that HP and Texas instrument made some of the most powerful calculator. I owned the 48g and 48gx and 49g. I don't think HP makes the best calculator anymore though...They've moved on to bigger things.
Fais said:
By the way is this not duplicating functionality??
That's a good point.
But maybe Apple allows it because it has many other functions besides the standard add, subtract, divide and multiply.
To be honest the HP "Calculators" were the first true portable computers.
http://www.hpmuseum.org/
We hear calculator today and think of a simple +_*/ device but they originally (and advanced modern ones still do) required advanced programming knowledge to operate. HP was truly an innovative company. Unfortunately I had to say was.
@nxp3
The hp we knew is still around. They just have a new name
http://www.home.agilent.com
To bad HP kept the calculator business when it spun the test & measurement division off.
When you get accustomed to RPN calculators, you cannot use standard calculator anymore!
I stall have a HP 11C from late '70 and now, I have a HP 11C on my iPhone... but it's not the official one :)
Its truly amazing that you found your way to all these colleges and classes with your head so far up your ass...
In other news... I need to learn RPN...
Don't be so hard on him. I know they exist, but the only ones you ever see around campus seem to be the TI-83/84.
HP calculators suck.
TI-83plus is the best calculator i have ever owned. It was later replaced by a TI-89ti when doing integrals got too annoying. Oh engineering school...
RPN is quite addicting.
HP48G rules. Reverse Polish Notation ftw!
If you once used a RPN calculater for a while you will understand all the advantages it has. Much easier, straightforward and faster.
Sad, that almost no RPN calculators get produced now and that they also do not get used in school.
TI-89 all the way.
Although Tetris on my old TI-86 is something I still miss.
I have to agree with this statement, but only because Space Invaders was so much fun.
I loved my HP calc. Not only was it awesome, but nobody ever wanted to borrow it. I'd let them, they'd try to do some simple math for about 2 minutes, get frustrated, give up, and hand it back to me. It was so easy to use, but nobody could ever figure it out...
My favorite calculator was a TI34(I think that was the number), it was a two line calculator with scrolling history. The entire math problem showed up on the first line(so it would display, say "(4x2)/2+5") and the second line would show the answer(9). It could scroll horizontal for long problems and vertically for history. My TI84 was fine for graphs, but for pure number crunching my TI34 was god.
And you used how many HP's?
Personally I could never figure out why HP never made a app for their PDA's. Idiots.
Well HP didn't make it but I have an HP 11C app on my HP iPAQ hx4700. I use the hx4700 every day. The BT keyboard and mouse are the best way to enter large amounts of data. It is great for entering and useing the RPN on the a11C emulator which I use just about every day. It works wonderfully. And yes! RPN ROCKS!
@Dustin
Shouldn't that be:
RPN quite addicting is.
You can't be an actual engineer and acknowledge any non-HP calculator. Your alma mater may be trying to take your degree back as we speak.
The TIs you mentioned are HP competitors. The TI BA II is a FINANCIAL calculator. All of the HPs I have seen are FINANCIAL calculators. So I am not surprised that non-business majors haven't heard of them.
if phones were allowed into the examination halls this is good but otherwise i have my computer next to me when doing complex stuff.
Yes the convenience factor is there, but for the price I'm sure a free or cheaper app will do the job or at least the vast majority of it. An actual TI BA II Plus can be had for under $30 and its probably a lot easier to hit the keys on.
Agreed. Nothing beats having an actual calculator on hand when you really need one.
except when you want to copy/paste some ridiculously-hard-to-remember result from your desk calculator! :p
Numbers aren't that hard to enter.
@Trafficblows
Why would you need to remember the number? Wouldn't the calculator keep the number value till you did something else with it or hell for that matter a TI BA II Plus has a built in Mem function for storing values?
TI-83x models are the best calculator imho.
I bet you will never see it, or any other decent programmable calculator, on the iphone though, since it can run emulated code, and that would breach the app store rules.
I was just wondering why they hadn't released a Ti emulator for the iphone yet. I've had a Ti emulator on my winmo phone since I got it and use it all the time.
Have you ever tried the TI-89? Now that calculator raped the 83
I used a Ti-83 emulator on my iPaq 1935 in my college stat class. I was worried the proof wouldn't let me use it because, honestly, I could have stored all kinds of cheat info in the thing, but she was more interested in it than against it. She trusted me (and I never cheated) so I was able to save quite a chunk of money by using a free app versus buy a calc I'd only need for one semester.
The other day in calculus class my teacher showed us a TI-92 or 93 or something. We all crapped our pants a little
Ti 83 is the best calculator? You must be an english major....
when I was in school, I remember some ppc app that can take different skin to be used as different calculators.
Umm they wanna make REAL money...
Make a TI-83+ app..
Impossible, because a TI83+ is able to run assembler and basic programs, things which aren't allowed on the iPhone, else it will explode and kill you :p
The TI-82 had some sweet games, way better than iphone's offerings.
no RPN = no Interest
"HP calculators suck."
Says the person that doesn't understand RPN. Give me a stack any day over an '='.
I still have have my HP48S after 17 years and use it every single day.
Nothing else is worth if you are an engineer, we used to make fun of people using TI's (although I recognize that they are better than HP's for electrical engineer students, but I can't live without RPN and those hard, sturdy buttons on my loved HP)
48SX here. the beeps alone are positive reinforcement of the days when I understood boundary equations well enough that the graphs made sense to me.
But, the tetris game is all I need now.
I guess we won't see these babies ported until the iPhone is intel based *laugh*
Unfortunately, my trusty 48SX (hand-me-down from my Dad, so I've no clue how old) finally gave up the ghost a few years back. I've still got a 48GX somewhere, but I mainly use a 50 these days. As an EE and ME, I tell you the 49/50, while not quite as solid mechanically as the 48, soundly thrash the TIs for all engineering disciplines -- and that's before you overclock it to 200MHz.
Not sure whether TIs can handle symbolic matrix inversion and multiplication at all, but not one in a class full of TI-using students knew how. The HP's CAS does it the simple and obvious way, making s-domain solutions of linear networks dead simple. Add in laplace transforms, symbolic solutions of differential equations, and full support for complex numbers throughout, and the _only_ deficiency I ever encountered was the relative incompatibiliy of units with symbolics, and the complete lack of unitful complexes. But I'm fairly certain the TIs don't do any bether.
Of course, it must suck to be a non-jailbreaking iPhone user, because you know that no decent calculator can make it into the app store, because the calculator is, at the core, just an RPL runtime.
If they did one of their graphing calcs it would be nice, but the way i look at it, if you need a calculator like this you either already have one, or your gonna buy the real thing so you can use it at work/school.