is it worth buying an hp 48gx or 50g in this 2023?

[hpmin48gx]

hello group, sometimes when I see the new color and touch calculators I wonder if you can still be proud with one of these 2 excellent calculators if you see it in a practical way, given the advancement of the new models

[Gil]

Great calculators, both of them.

Try and install on your phone the EMU48 application, that replicates the HP48-50g (& other models), but run 100 x faster than the physical, original calculators.

Gil

[Chad]

Greetings,
If you are into surveying software, I would recommend Jacob Wall's excellent program Cogo+ Pro. Recently I was looking for updates and noticed that is free of charge now, some years ago it was something like $275 USD. A 50G cannot run a survey instrument, however with Cogo+ Pro you can do comps that you used to do on a TDS48 but you are able save your points as ASCII or DXF or KML or Lat/Long files, store them on a 1 or 2 GB Secure Digital card that the 50G accepts, pull out said SD card and transfer back and forth with a computer. If you do coordinate comps and have a 50G...why not?
check out Simple Geospatial Solutions at https://sgss.ca/index.html and scroll down to 50G software. If you want his software for the HP Prime, that you pay for.
Chad
HP 45, HP 67, HP 41's C, CV & CX, HP 42s, HP48SX, HP48GX, HP 50G, HP Prime, I am a big fan of Thomas Okken's Free42 loaded on a smartphone & then punching in my old 42 survey software from the late 80's and early 90's. Much of which is available on hpcalc.org (RIP Ted & Thanks still!) Being able to do things like grade intersections quickly on your phone can be handy.

[johnb]

One of the machines in my regular "daily driver" rotation is a 48g.

Even though I now use less than 10% of its overall functionality, it's still a joy to use, for its multi-level display and unlimited stack. I have an interval arithmetic library I wrote for it: not perfect, but still very good for when I am doing calculations with lopsided uncertainties or different ones in different steps.

The built-in date/time math is also easier to use than on some of my other models, so it's my go-to calculator for that as well.

I've never tried carrying around a calculator this large, but mostly I am near a desk at most times now, and can easily just reach for it if I need it.

So, yeah, 48gx or 50g+, still a good investment!

[Allen]

(01-30-2023 03:21 PM)hpmin48gx Wrote:  hello group, sometimes when I see the new color and touch calculators I wonder if you can still be proud with one of these 2 excellent calculators if you see it in a practical way, given the advancement of the new models

... when I see the new [4090 GPU with 24-core CPU processor and 64 GB RAM] ... I wonder if you can still be proud with [any hand held calculator] if you see it in a practical way, given the advancement of [Moores law]

It really depends on your perspective. I like my calculators just as much, and besides, I don't get to enjoy handing my computer to people and counting to 10 before they say "Hey, there's no EQUALS button on this.."

[Siegfried]

(02-02-2023 05:12 AM)Allen Wrote:  I like my calculators just as much, and besides, I don't get to enjoy handing my computer to people and counting to 10 before they say "Hey, there's no EQUALS button on this.."

Last time I experienced this was in senior high school but I still cherish the memory of having a "lend-proof" calculator.

[polbit]

(01-30-2023 03:44 PM)Gil Wrote:  Great calculators, both of them.

Try and install on your phone the EMU48 application, that replicates the HP48-50g (& other models), but run 100 x faster than the physical, original calculators.

Gil

Emu48 has been my "calculator" for casual use for a while now. Having grown up on 28/48/50 lineage, I love being able to use 48g key layout with real speed.

[ttw]

(02-03-2023 02:39 AM)polbit Wrote:  

(01-30-2023 03:44 PM)Gil Wrote:  Great calculators, both of them.

Try and install on your phone the EMU48 application, that replicates the HP48-50g (& other models), but run 100 x faster than the physical, original calculators.

Gil

Emu48 has been my "calculator" for casual use for a while now. Having grown up on 28/48/50 lineage, I love being able to use 48g key layout with real speed.

I am using Em48 regularly. The HP50g version has enough big integer stuff that I can do reasonably serious number theory. It's much easier to program the Pari. My only problem is getting really large integers out to text. I have been kludging it by displaying the integers in 15-digit chunks (or so) and using a screen capture that's on the phone.

[Wes Loewer]

(02-03-2023 09:06 AM)ttw Wrote:  My only problem is getting really large integers out to text. I have been kludging it by displaying the integers in 15-digit chunks (or so) and using a screen capture that's on the phone.

You should be able to use the Copy Stack feature to copy the large integer in one big chunk.

Edit: Seems that Copy Stack can only copy up to 127 characters. I wonder if that is a bug or just a limitation. Still, copying 127 digits at a time is better than 15.

[DavidM]

(02-03-2023 11:05 AM)Wes Loewer Wrote:  Seems that Copy Stack can only copy up to 127 characters. I wonder if that is a bug or just a limitation. Still, copying 127 digits at a time is better than 15.

If you convert it to a string before copying, you should be able to get everything in one step.

Example (exact mode, of course):

999 FACT
→STR
<Copy Stack from EMU48's Edit menu>

Pasting into a text editor of your choice should result in the entire string of 2565 digits.

[Gjermund Skailand]

If you work with numerical matrix / eigenvalues / vectors etc then it is an excellent and quick calculator with some extra software. Especially if you install hpgcc3 and libraries with software programmed in C.
Gjermund

[ttw]

(02-03-2023 12:39 PM)DavidM Wrote:  

(02-03-2023 11:05 AM)Wes Loewer Wrote:  Seems that Copy Stack can only copy up to 127 characters. I wonder if that is a bug or just a limitation. Still, copying 127 digits at a time is better than 15.

If you convert it to a string before copying, you should be able to get everything in one step.

Example (exact mode, of course):

999 FACT
→STR
<Copy Stack from EMU48's Edit menu>

Pasting into a text editor of your choice should result in the entire string of 2565 digits.

Thanks. It looks like this will work.