Need for paper & pencil with 48/49/50 calculators

[john gustaf stebbins]

With the 48/49/50 I did find that most problems I worked with those machines could be done sans paper and pencil. Not that I never used paper and pencil. I would use the file system to create folders for each problem or class of problems I worked on. I could then save intermediate results and other information in the folder and switch between projects or problems by switching folders.

This is what I miss most using the Prime. Having only a limited number of variables and only one set of them means I need to clear out the calculator for each problem I work on. They have implemented a save feature, which would probably help, though I've not been able to make it work for me as yet. Any problem that is amenable to programming gives much more flexibility with the Prime, but it is not as flexible for problem solving as the 48/49/50 system. The Prime is really more a successor to the 38/40 machines which had similar limitations which are selling points in the educational market.