Why are the HP Prime and HP-35s so unpopular?

[John Keith]

(02-02-2021 10:19 PM)David Hayden Wrote:  I like the Prime a lot, even though it's a big departure from RPN and RPL, it's what a modern calculator should be (backlit color screen, multi-touch, modern programming language, fast, lots of memory, I/O).

The 35s is a great form factor, the keyboard is pretty nice and the display is good, but it's incredibly slow for when it was made. The lack of P->R and R->P commands is mystifying, as is the inability to extract the parts of an imaginary number.

But my biggest complaint with the 35s is the lack of labels. Sure you can GTO and XEQ a line number, but that only helps if you've already written that line! In other words, it's nearly impossible to branch forward. You can write a dummy branch, then add the rest of the code, and then modify the branch. Now let's see, if I delete a branch at line 12 that went to line 19, that moves line 19 to line 18, so does the new branch go to line 18 or 19? Hmm...

I'm not sure I would classify PPL as a "modern" programming language. It seems to me to be a step backwards in power and usability compared to RPL. That, combined with the CAS/Home dichotomy and poor documentation lead me to use the Prime a lot less than the older, slower 50g.

I don't worry much about the bugs and misfeatures of the 35s, I just use it as a general purpose calculator in my workshop. It's fine for that purpose and I don't have to worry about messing up one of my good calculators.

All IMHO, of course.