Why do calculator manufactures like to reinvent the wheel?

[Angus]

Having higher powered hardware at hand developers are easily mislead into designing a kind of consumer-like device.
Say a smartphone. No need to be carefully engineered. It will be thrown away soon enough... No need to spend too much time in details.

Think about the prime. To me things like flickering screen and numerous obvious flaws sign of unfaithful engineering. That should not happen with a calculator demanding to be choosen over a smartphone.
That is my own opinion. If one is more economically oriented than engineering centric a different opinion is fine.
I fully understand HP67's thinking and argumentation (plus I do share it mostly), but HP needs to do proper work on such devices otherwise people like me don't trust in solid developed devices for too long.
That said: I am not sure who will be right. Considering the carelessness of both customers and companies I can kind of imagine Manolo might be proven right in the future.
Althogh my pedantic, engineering innermost hopes that quality will be victorious and the calculator will survive. Evolved, yes please.

[Stefan]

(03-11-2014 12:57 PM)HP67 Wrote:  If I understand correctly, your experience seems to be mostly in academia, while I was talking about industry and the public works and commercial sectors.

Yes true, my main experiences have been so far in school and university. However if I count it all together I've already worked 3 years in industry so far, all in electrical engineering departments (so it's not like I've worked in production or at McDonalds where it would be obvious that there are no HP calcs around ^^).

[Stefan]

(03-11-2014 01:04 PM)HP67 Wrote:  Does the Prime require you to use the touchscreen? I mean, can everything be done with the keyboard and the touch screen can be used optionally, or does it require that some things are only possible with the touch screen?

At least for the on-screen menu (the 6 soft buttons on the bottom of the screen) you have to use the touchscreen. But it would be much less pleasurable to use the Prime without the TS. I think this is one of the best features.

[HP67]

(03-11-2014 01:12 PM)Angus Wrote:  Having higher powered hardware at hand developers are easily mislead into designing a kind of consumer-like device. Say a smartphone. No need to be carefully engineered. It will be thrown away soon enough... No need to spend too much time in details.

You know, this is really on the mark. I was reading a thread the other day on a mailing list and they were discussing cheap Android phones from China. It turns out that they are selling millions of Android devices with no update capability. It is just as you said, they are designed to be disposable from the get-go. I just don't understand this approach, and if I could understand it I don't agree with it. I'm used to working on stuff that has a fairly long lifetime, and although today things are not what they used to be, we used to take the time to design stuff to last. The very idea that people could spend millions on R&D and tooling that they know will be obsolete in a few years is scary. And yet that is exactly what's happening. It's partially because of the growth and progress in hardware development but also partially because people have a disposable mentality.

On the other hand, my HP 67 is still perfectly useful today. For programming the HP 48 is a gigantic step ahead and a visible stack helps in long calculations. I like stuff made well, made to last. That's what the HP I knew and loved was all about. I realize those days are mostly gone, but should we be considered nuts for still valuing that?

(03-11-2014 01:12 PM)Angus Wrote:  I fully understand HP67's thinking and argumentation (plus I do share it mostly), but HP needs to do proper work on such devices otherwise people like me don't trust in solid developed devices for too long.

I believe you would find a 50g much more to your liking. The Prime isn't for the traditional HP calculator consumer. Tim has said it and we all know it. It's HP's attempt to break into the education market that TI has ruled for decades already. I hope they succeed, because variety and choices are good. But no matter what, we're still up against manufacturing techniques and materials choices that are going to make any new device disposable. I read a post on here that talked about the problems of lead-free solder and I asked some friends of mine in engineering and one guy who is a wizard in tech. They told me the clock is ticking on this stuff from the minute it comes off the reflow bench.

(03-11-2014 01:12 PM)Angus Wrote:  Althogh my pedantic, engineering innermost hopes that quality will be victorious and the calculator will survive. Evolved, yes please.

I'm always glad to see someone else who gives a damn, because I often feel like there are not enough people like that any more.

[HP67]

(03-11-2014 01:16 PM)Stefan Wrote:  Yes true, my main experiences have been so far in school and university. However if I count it all together I've already worked 3 years in industry so far, all in electrical engineering departments (so it's not like I've worked in production or at McDonalds where it would be obvious that there are no HP calcs around ^^).

Well, that's all I was saying. HP never made much inroads in education, that is what the Prime is about. Actually, calculators were somewhat rare generally when I was in college. Anyway in the areas I mentioned I have seldom seen a calculator that wasn't an HP.

(03-11-2014 01:20 PM)Stefan Wrote:  At least for the on-screen menu (the 6 soft buttons on the bottom of the screen) you have to use the touchscreen. But it would be much less pleasurable to use the Prime without the TS. I think this is one of the best features.

Thanks for the info. I dislike touch screen devices but it also took me a few decades to accept LCDs so I will check back again in 2045 or so and maybe it will be time to reconsider.

[Angus]

Wouldn't it be better if HP also kept an eye on people like me and not solely the education market? I mean if the educational market is not a reliable one and about to switch over to tablets any time you would try to satisfy other customers aswell.

The prime in general is a very powerful and potent device just partially ill-conveiced. (I remember I was once explained I didn't get the idea of having two parsers who act independently of eachother. What I still don't get because they are linked at a certain level. e.g. interchangable commands which are not compatible in detail. I have the feeling there are problems with fully integrating the xcas into core routines )
HP just needs to bother a little more about details and quality.

I don't need a super complicated calculator - easy to use, yet powerful is all I need.

BUT the concerns with firmware update, even unimportant aspects like the flicker, unwanted capitalized letters and many other things could be easily avoided and I am sure that HP was aware of these prior their launch. Hopefully these were known issues to be more precise....
That's the whole point.


Edit: When thinking of the education market - I think there are many teachers out there who also care about pretended vanities but need to be convinced to switch over to HP instead of, say TI.....

[Han]

(03-11-2014 10:15 AM)HP67 Wrote:  Above you just said BlackBerry died because it had keys but now you seem to be saying some people must have keys for efficiency. Therefore, the demise of BlackBerry is because of efficiency? Perhaps I agree with your conclusion, but not for the same reasons as you

No, what I'm saying is there will always be some in each camp. One camp likes the keys because of efficiency, the other side detests the keys (even if it means more efficiency) in favor of thin, sleeker looking devices (that may not necessarily be better spec-wise). The only thing that will change is the relative size of each camp. It's pretty much the same with Windows 8 -- some folks really dig the touchscreen interface, whereas a large number of folks couldn't care less for the gimmicky touchscreen interface when they're still using non-touchscreens, a keyboard, and mouse.

As for the earlier comments along the lines of "why not implement an already known or popular language like C/C++/Phython/etc" -- none of those languages are suited for the intended market: students and education. The folks who would benefit from having, say, Python be the default language are folks who have already had training in said language (and hence are likely not a student or instructor). To teach programming, you would need a language as close to pseudo-code as possible without having to muck around with all the nuances of the more popular languages.

[Harold A Climer]

This has been an interesting thread, but I would like to come at this from a Physics teachers perspective.
I have taught students in the Physics Dept. at U.T. Chattanooga since the middle eighties. My first calculator was a HP-25C in the 70s,then a HP-41 in 1983.
I also have a 48SX,48GX, and 50G.
I think, IMHO, that cell phones with calculators are one one most ill-conceived ideas (for students that is) along with the Trickle Down Economy.
I have had students use cell phones,etc. to text test questions to students in other sections during exams. I have also found students send data from experiments to other students so the other students did not have to come to lab to turn a report.
It is no wonder certain calculators and devices are prohibited for use in Engineering and Surveying exams in the U.S.
In many Engineering classes here at U.T.C. certain calculators are not to be used
for faculty generated exams.
In the Physics Dept. Cell Phones,personal laptops,tablets,etc.are not permitted for labs and exams. Each lab station has a Dell desktop and other equipment sufficient to do any of our lab experiments.
After a student graduates cellphone,tablet are probably permissible.
However considering the cheating scandal with the U.S. Air Force involving the Nuclear Missile officers, I wonder even about that.
Stand alone calculators are sill needed.