HP-25 purpose

[Steve Simpkin]

Consider that this was only the third programmable calculator that HP had designed and ROM and transistors were still expensive to make. From the HP Museum HP-25 page. "The HP-25 started on the drawing board as a scientific calculator with a much larger set of functions than the HP-21. By the time it was done, it was that and it was programmable with 49 lines of memory, making it the least expensive and smallest of HP's programmable calculators. Like the HP-65, the HP-25 caused disbelief in many. It seemed much too small to do so much. "

See the description of the development of the HP-25 on page 4 of the following Nov 1975 HP Journal extract.
http://hparchive.com/Journals/HPJ-1975-11.pdf