Oh what to do with extra manuals?

[DaveBr]

I had a couple of manuals, HP18C and HP19BII, that I didn't have the associated calculators.

I was going to list them for sale on the forum, but then I had a great idea... Add a couple of calculators to the herd.

Little surfing and I was able to find both an 18C and a 19BII in great for a good deal on TAS (less than $25 for both). Now I no longer have any orphaned manuals. Problem solved!

These are my first clamshell calculators, interesting indeed.

Dave

[Dave Britten]

(10-31-2021 10:22 PM)DaveBr Wrote:  I was going to list them for sale on the forum, but then I had a great idea... Add a couple of calculators to the herd.

Always a sound idea! I really like the 19BII. Ostensibly it's a financial calculator, but it has a full complement of scientific functions and unit conversions, and the solver that can do some pretty sophisticated programming.

[DaveBr]

While I'm a bit unsure of the clamshell design, the 19BII is quite nice. The keys feel great and like you mentioned it has a pretty rich feature set. I never got into using the solver, preferring to write FOCAL programs. Now figuring how to efficiently use the solver instead of writing programs occupies some of my spare time.
Dave

[Dave Britten]

(11-01-2021 02:51 PM)DaveBr Wrote:  While I'm a bit unsure of the clamshell design, the 19BII is quite nice. The keys feel great and like you mentioned it has a pretty rich feature set. I never got into using the solver, preferring to write FOCAL programs. Now figuring how to efficiently use the solver instead of writing programs occupies some of my spare time.
Dave

Take a look at HP-27S/19B Technical Applications in the museum document collection. There's a lot of nice stuff in there. But if you're not careful, you'll end up hunting for a 27S to round out the collection.

[Bill (Smithville NJ)]

(11-01-2021 01:53 AM)Dave Britten Wrote:  Always a sound idea! I really like the 19BII. Ostensibly it's a financial calculator, but it has a full complement of scientific functions and unit conversions, and the solver that can do some pretty sophisticated programming.

I found that using the solver on the 19BII was a frustrating experience. It's inability to save a partial, incomplete, or wrong equation was a deal breaker for me. Attempting to enter/edit complicated solver equations is difficult without the ability to save it even when it's wrong.

The 17BII lets you save partial or wrong equations. Makes for a better development cycle. Of course it's lacking some of the math functions that the 19BII has.


73
Bill WD9EQD
Smithville, NJ

[oldhpfan]

(10-31-2021 10:22 PM)DaveBr Wrote:  These are my first clamshell calculators, interesting indeed.

Dave

I liked the clamshell...fold the thing all the way under for a simple calculator or fold the second keyboard out for when you need the advanced stuff. That said I do like the Prime layout and size....but for its time the clamshell was nice. Also the calculator was nicely protected when closed which was useful whenon the go.
How about adding a clamshell to the prime like one of the fold out phones, but with a qwerty backlit keyboard and a small second display with a set of extra soft menu keys...might be worth the extra bulk....pure fantasy of course.

[Dave Britten]

(11-01-2021 04:42 PM)Bill (Smithville NJ) Wrote:  

(11-01-2021 01:53 AM)Dave Britten Wrote:  Always a sound idea! I really like the 19BII. Ostensibly it's a financial calculator, but it has a full complement of scientific functions and unit conversions, and the solver that can do some pretty sophisticated programming.

I found that using the solver on the 19BII was a frustrating experience. It's inability to save a partial, incomplete, or wrong equation was a deal breaker for me. Attempting to enter/edit complicated solver equations is difficult without the ability to save it even when it's wrong.

The 17BII lets you save partial or wrong equations. Makes for a better development cycle. Of course it's lacking some of the math functions that the 19BII has.


73
Bill WD9EQD
Smithville, NJ

The 27S will get you the math functions, but it too lacks the unit conversions of the 19BII. For the best experience, get a 200LX, which includes all the functions and conversions, and has a massive screen for entering equations!

[Bill (Smithville NJ)]

(11-01-2021 05:59 PM)Dave Britten Wrote:  The 27S will get you the math functions, but it too lacks the unit conversions of the 19BII. For the best experience, get a 200LX, which includes all the functions and conversions, and has a massive screen for entering equations!

I've never had the 27S, but it does look interesting.

I agree about the HP-200LX. For many years, it was my main portable computer. Before smart phones, it was my main PDA.

And it was great for developing solve routines on it and then type the finished product into the 17BII or 19BII.

73
Bill WD9EQD
Smithville, NJ

[DaveBr]

(11-01-2021 03:22 PM)Dave Britten Wrote:  Take a look at HP-27S/19B Technical Applications in the museum document collection. There's a lot of nice stuff in there. But if you're not careful, you'll end up hunting for a 27S to round out the collection.

I have a 27S in 'as new condition' and a printed copy of the manual from a .pdf file. If it was RPN it would be perfect. The manual describing the solver functions shows the 27S is an extremely powerful problem solver - see what I did there

The HP-27S/19B Technical Applications book looks interesting, full of solver solutions to a variety of common and uncommon questions. Thanks for the tip.

Dave

[CMarangon]

Hello!

Supposing that you are in the USA or Europe you can also try sell it on eBay.com.

If you are in Latin America, probably you will also need to pay shipping rates to send them for free
and this will still give you a loss of 4 dollars :-(

People are downloading these manuals from some sites, for free.

Good luck!