hp calculators slow

niehls

Am i the only one that considers the hp calculators way too slow? I have a HP 49G and i love it. Except the fact that i waste minutes just going through the menus. All HP calculators i've tested is slow. (Compared to Texas ti-models at least). For example, exiting from some menu may take up to like 5-10 seconds. Also drawing graphics is really slow. It takes a long time before it even starts drawing. I assume this is due to calculations but why does the ti-calculators perform this task (among others) so much faster?

Don't get me wrong. I love my HP. I just don't like wasting half of my time on the exam on walking through menus.

Does anyone know if the have solved this problem in their 49G+ calculator. I'm thinking about buying one, but i need to know if its as slow as the 49G

Cheers.

dduardo

Get the TI-89 Titanium. It comes with a 14Mhz Motorola 68k processor and built in usb.

graphic7

The 49G uses a 9mHz Saturn processor, I believe. I could be wrong about the exact processor speed, but it's based on the HP48G series' CPU, which was 4mHz. I'm a proud owner of a 48GX, myself, and I love them. The TI-83 and 86, et al. all use a Z80 procesor, which is a bit slower than a Saturn, even the 4mhz ones. The 89's, 92's, etc. all use M68000-based processors. These happen to be fairly decent, and range from 8-14mHz depending on your TI model, and are much faster than any Saturn.

The 49G+ uses a 75mHz ARM-based processor, which is much, much faster than the M68k's. At the moment the 49G+ is actually emulating a Saturn. This will soon change when HP finishes rewriting the environment for the 49G+. So, you can even expect much higher speeds than what the 49G+ is currently putting out.

The 49G+ is technically superior at the moment to any TI calculator, not to mention you have a pretty standardized storage media - SmartMedia cards. The new TI-89's top out about 2mb of memory, whereas you could throw a 64mb SmartMedia card into your 49G+. You'll also have USB connectivity.

The 49G+ is cheaper or close to the price of a TI-89 Platinum edition. Not to mention, you won't have a calculator that looks like a toy.

You'll be highly pleased with the 49G+ if you buy one, but I emphasize that you should buy it from HP directly. Retail stores could still have a stock of older HP calculators that had defects. If you buy one directly from HP, these defects will not be present.

Edit: There's away to dub down the accuracy of the plotting application on HP calculators. I've done it on my 48GX, however, I have long forgotten how to do it. It does exist, so it shouldn't he hard to find it in the manual or any online documentation. You'll get much better performance out of it; similar to a TI-83 and the accuracy loss is hardly noticeable.

franznietzsche

I WANT!!!

What's the price on that?

(As if the 89 itself isn't good enough, geek that i am, have to upgrade...)

The_Professional

But does it run Linux?

franznietzsche

OOOOHHH!!

New project, let's see who can run linux on their TI-89 titanium first!!

chroot

I'm surprised TI and HP haven't bit the bullet and put out an emulated calculator program for Palm or WinCE devices.

- Warren

graphic7

The HP49G+ would be much more capable of running Linux. I'm not sure if you can actually use Linux on it at the moment, but it is a 75mHz 32-bit ARM-based processor, which is far superior to that of a 14mHz M68K. Not to mention you have expandability - something the TI-89 does not have. How do you plan on booting anything other than the kernel with 2mb of flash memory?

You could actually have a small and quite usable Linux distribution on a 128mb flash card.

graphic7

Emu48 and the TI emulator (Virtual something (?)), both have Windows CE versions.

Your point is valid, though. Both companies do produce inexpensive handheld devices, and they could do away with their hardware divisions that produce the calculator hardware. Emulating the calculators would in no way make the calculator lose it's qualities that it had beforehand. You'd still be able to use RPN on an emulated HP49G+.

Integral

I haven't had a new HP for nearly 20yrs ( I still have my 28c). Do the new ones still use RPN? (Non RPN calculator = toy)

graphic7

Amen!

HP still offers RPN on the HP49 series (graphing calculators) and on the HP33 series (scientific calculators). They've put algebraic modes on most of them. Even my 32SII and 48GX have algebraic modes, however, RPN is still the primary mode. HP does have a few series of calculators where algebraic mode is the only mode supported.

The copyright on my 48GX is 1992, and the copyright on my 32SII is 1989. The features of the 48GX were not duplicated until HP created the TI-92 which was many years later. As for my 32SII, no other scientific calculator can compare to it's usability and form.

Edit: An interesting fact is that HP calculators still sell for higher dollar values on Ebay than their original retail values. I had to pay $150 for my 48GX last year, and it's worth every penny. It's difficult to find a perfect condition 48GX (discontinued) like mine was, for under $200, now. The 32SII (discontinued, as well) is generating values of $150+, as well. Keep in mind, that the 32SII sold for $75 at it's high point. Show me a TI that will sell higher used than it's original retail value.

imabug

The HP 49G+ actually isn't made by HP, but by an OEM. From The Museum of HP Calculators:
I seem to recall reading somewhere a while ago that while the 49G+ used an ARM processor, it still used the original HP calculator OS written for the Saturn chip used in the HP48 series and ran in an emulation mode on the ARM processor. This is only a vague recollection though and I'm not positive this is true.

franznietzsche

Yeah, but the motorola processor is known to be able to run the kernel. What about the HPs? if you could set it up to run off a usb drive plugged in (even though i couldn't even get my computer to boot from, bios didn't want to.) then you could run something akin to a full DSL or Slax distribution.

Being the geek that i am, i think the whole idea just oozes awesomeness.

JasonRox

I got a POCKET PC! HAHA!

312mhz 32 ram

franznietzsche

How much did that cost you?

Curious3141

I have an old HP-42S with the RPN (won it in a Tech competition). Pity, the LCD is destroyed from age or heat, who knows ? But I can't get a replacement for it because HP stopped supporting the model long ago.

Still works, but it's difficult to see the display. Can anyone recommend me a good replacement that can do everything this model can plus more ? I love the way this calc handles complex numbers as if they were no different from reals, a new model must have that robustness.

franznietzsche

THe TI-89s ad HP4-49Gs are both capable of that.