Vintage Calculators

[Sinewave]

Whilst doing my accounts this evening, I thought to myself, just how old is my calculator?

I'm using a Casio fx-31.

I found this interesting website (no affiliation)

http://www.calculator.org/default.aspx


It says my fx-31 was introduced in 1978 and then discontinued in 1980.

For some reason, I have a bit of a thing for calculators, especially the old Casio's with the flourescent displays.

Another one close to my heart is the Casio fx-570C, as my father gave this to me and I used it all through my college years. Introduced in 1985 and then discontinued in 1989!

Are there any other vintage calculator collectors/enthusiasts here in Golbourne Radio?

[Refugee]

I have got one that used to belong to my father and it still works. It was very expensive when it was new.
http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/3...alculator/

[ppppenguin]

I have 2 vintage calculators. One is a Texas SR50 scientific which I bought in my first year of university, 1975. It was expensive (ISTR £47) but worth every penny. The other is the famous HP35, daddy of pcoket scientific calcs which I picked up for a nominal amount at Harpenden many years ago. A gorgeous bit of engineering. HP's reverse polish logic always made perfect sense to me.

My daily use calc, a Texas TI-36X solar powered scientific/engineering, is quite vintage now. Mine looks like the 1993 version: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TI-36

[Keithstv]

At university one of my fellow students bought an HP35 not long after they came out. I think it cost about £180. However he was banned from using it in exams so had to resort to the old log tables. We reckoned he could make mistakes faster than anyone else and make them more accurately.

I have a CBM SR37 bought through my first job in 1975 costing about £35 which still works although the internal nicads failed years ago and were removed so it's a mains only calculator now. I also have a Casio FX570c bought in 1991 which is on it's second battery and is my daily use calculator.

Keith

[peter scott]

A gorgeous bit of engineering. HP's reverse polish logic always made perfect sense to me.

Absolutely agree!

Fewer key strokes and intermediate answers are always where you want them. Four function calculators are crude and dreadful to use on anything but the simplest calculation. I use Free42 on all my devices.

Peter (retired HP employee)

[Murphyv310]

Hi.
Still got my Dads Fx31 but it died a few years ago, will need to see if I can repair it. Recently repaired his old Zeon LCD watch which was one of the first here, he was a bit of a gadget man in his day.
Also trying to source a LDR for his old Ambassador light meter, it has lost its sensitivity and the meter reads very low indeed.

[Kalee20]

I still use my Casio FX-501P programmable calculator in the 'day job'. It's been fantastic! I bought it in October 1980 during my first term at university, £54.95 from WH Smiths, Cornmarket St, Oxford. I use the programmable facility maybe 10 times a year still. And although I'm a fan of Excel spreadsheets, when creating a new one I check the results of the spreadsheet manually, with the calculator, as a sanity check.

I did take the calculator apart once, for a good clean and regrease with contact-treatment, when it was getting 'iffy. That was 19 years ago. It has never missed a beat since.


I do have the FA-1 adaptor to store programs and data, and to play tunes - but this hasn't even used for I guess 25 years.

My only regret is that I didn't buy the FX-502P (with double the program storage). But Smiths didn't stock it, and I didn't know of its existence at the time!

[djrm]

I just love old calculators, I'm building qute a collection now.

The photo is of one of my oldest which I found in a drawer at my Dad's house. Its gimmick is to use a stylus on a wire to enter the digits, a bit rubbish really and the arithmatic isnt quie right either.

I used to use Casio programmable calculators a lot to work out sun and moon positions,  these were always spot on and faster tan some of the alternatives.
Recentley I have bought some mechanical calculators, one like the ones we used at school before electronics were common.

[djrm]

Here is a picture of a couple of LED display calculators, I very much like the Texas programmer calculator, it does number base conversions with very few key presses and I keep  it on my desk at ome ready to use. I've not used the Commodore one in ernest but it is fully working. David
   

[Refugee]

I have got one of those Commodore ones that I had at college but sadly the display has started loosing some of the digits about 6 months after I replaced the Nicad cells with Nimh ones.
I am on the lookout for a broken one with a good display to fix it.