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You're a hero of mine so here is my story.

Me in math class in 1996 - I had a TI-82 things are programmable so I have no formal education, my parents are illiterate, and taught myself to program, and I begged them to buy me one.

I spent time learning how to code on it, writing from scratch, the game Spyhunter.

I couldn't figure out how to draw with lines or pixels so I used ASCII or text.

I presented this to my teacher who told me "these aren't for games". I was crushed.

You sir are the hardest person on HN

Perhaps this is a foolish question: how did your friend actually use the tracker? Did he input the prices from the newspapers or TV news?

How long were you locked up in the clink for? Did you get any access to computers there? How did your time there affect you or change how you think? Thanks for sharing

I feel like there’s a blog post in here somewhere…!

They had TI-85's in late '90s? I remember there only being TI-83s.

That's such a fantastic story.

Love this

this made me giggle lol

Was this the first time you had realized that they did, in fact, love you the entire time?

My dad got a free palm pilot m125 or something and I used a ti/HP calculator emulator on it since my parents thought buying a $99+ calculator was too expensive. fun writing apps in basic for that thing and the games for it were the best mobile ones. I did envy people with Mario and drug wars on their calculators though.

Must have been closer to 20 years, 84(+) didn't come out until 2004.

Gonna be pedantic/crotchety about this because I got into advanced math classes but it was my brother who got the 84+ (I had to settle for a 83+). Guess who's the engineer now, and who's the NEET? Your kids pay attention to what (who) you value, folks.

Every time I see a post about the TI calculators, I think about how much I dislike their interface, and it's all because I started out on a Casio.

Hahaha! This is great.

Somewhat related. My mom once yelled at me for losing a necklace she really liked. Then we were moving her stuff out of her house and found the necklace behind a wardrobe, wedged between it and the wall. It had been there for like 40 years, layered in dust.

Much nostalgia. The TI-83 Z80 was how I learned assembly as a teenager, so I could write better calculator games than was possible with TI Basic. Many others here had a similar experience, I’m sure. It’s been a couple decades, but I’m sure I’d still remember most of it if you put me down in front of a bunch of Z80 asm code.

One thing that I remember vividly was you had no MUL or DIV, so you have to implement them yourself with shifts, adds, subtraction, etc. This was an extremely useful learning experience

Fun memory trip. Learned assembly on those old Z80s in middle school. I had to go re-dig up SafeGuard, a program I made by reverse engineering TI's TestGuard, to stop admins from wiping your calculator memory and all your games! https://mikeknoop.com/upload/safeguard/

Does this mean uncle worm won’t run on it out of the box? A tragedy

>cemetech

>Kerm Martian

There's some names I haven't heard in a while :)

Real shame since cortex has a admin TrustZone processor that is licensed to special interests only. For the educational market, this "security" is a selling point. It guarantees that a student isn't running unauthorized code or "cheating" apps. It also likely allows OTA auditing of the classroom's state.

One-shotted with Claude Code. Chef kiss.

I wonder how many of us had the exact same experience (down to those damn three little dots!)

I certainly got a lot of educational value out of mine. I managed to program a fully functional Minesweeper game on mine, using the built-in programming tools - no transferring efficient binaries via cable!

But yes. 99% of what we did with them in class - when we were even allowed to use them - could have been handled by a little solar-powered calculator with basic arithmetic functions.

I sort of agree.

You're paying $100 for completely antiquated hardware where its core feature is "it doesn't do much".

Pretty much any professional environment that you will need calculations will have access to a computer that can do these calculations significantly faster and better.

I thought my HP was pretty cool in high school, but pretty much the moment I graduated I stopped using it because I figured out how to use Excel and/or a programming language to do number crunchy stuff. Even for CAS stuff, I would just use Wolfram Alpha or SageMath (depending on how ambitious I'm feeling with setting stuff up).

I can't remember the last time I used a calculator outside of showing someone else how to use it.

I learned programming on that calculator. I learned programming because of that calculator. I owe so much to that calculator.

Agreed, it's insane to me that in an era of Google Colab (et al) schools still require students to shell out >$100 for one of these. I'm sure there is some backroom arrangement with schools of some kind.

TI-86 is the one in my case. We had to buy it in high school, and I used it so much in high school and in university after (I still have it in a box), that it's the only calculator I've since used. I absolutely have to have a TI emulator on my phone, and have paid for multiple ones along the years.

I use my emulated TI-86 every other day, and prefer it to any other UI I've seen on calculators on phones.

When I have a laptop available, I of course use excel or wolfram alpha for anything demanding, but when on the go, I like my emulated TI-86.

I got an HP50g from Craigslist in high school that

- was cheaper than a TI

- had a primitive CAS system

- teachers had no idea how to put it into test mode

It carried me through AP calc BC, I would’ve gotten <4 off of my own knowledge alone

I had a TI-83 in high school and upgraded to a TI-89 for college circa 2002. Used the heck out of those calculators because I did all the math and physics prerequisites for an engineering degree before switching to CS. It also helped me get a B in Linear Algebra thanks to holding a cheat sheet document for the final exam. I had no trouble with the likes of Calculus 3 and differential equations but for some reason the later material in linear algebra didn't click with me.

30 years ago, we had the option of the TI-82 Or (83?) and the 85. A bunch of the kids with the 85 were playing Tetris and some were writing little programs. I got the cheaper 82/83, and I don't actually remember using it for anything, even once, even though I did the IB track (stats, trig, algebra, calculus, etc).

I used mine constantly in highschool (10 years ago).

It's wild how much curricula within high schools must differ, because my school went out of its way to teach and encourage/require its use on nearly every quiz and exam. We joked sometimes class felt more like calculator class than math class. This was Texas, too, which I hardly consider a pioneer in education. Maybe TI pride?

Now that I think about it, this could have been a strategy my high school drilled into us as a way to increase SAT scores, since TI-84s were allowed to be used there.

>We had to buy those calculators for highschool and it was a waste of money, felt like somebody must be paying somebody off to have thousands of students buy a device that they will certainly never have to use (and is of little educational value).

I suppose it depends if you took advanced math classes or not.

Not only did we use it several times every week for 4 years, I spent 4 years writing tons of programs on it. Best $100 ever spent, thanks mom & dad.

This is probably right, but just to note that it's very much a generational thing. When I got a TI-83 (and then eventually an 89!) it was easily the most advanced handheld computing hardware I had ever been exposed to. The iPhone made sense to me, and I knew it would be huge, the day it came out because of these amazing calculators.

I know technology has moved on and all, but much nostalgic respect to these amazing calculators.

Definitely. At the very least, given the slow change in which ones are accepted, a cheap rental setup seems like the baseline that should exist... but everyone had to buy their own for my schools.

concur .. better to have a 40-buck fx82 for daily math and use Desmos for graphing, than fork out 250 to 300 for a super-duper calc they wont use.

I was in (Catholic) HS 30 years ago and we used our TI-82s extensively in AP Calc.

Probably have not touched mine since college.

Well, the TI-83/84 are called a graphing calculators for a reason: you can plot equations and datasets with them and look at them right there[1]. Looking at graphs is huge for learning, or at least it was for me, and school isn't just about plugging things in and getting an answer (or shouldn't be, at least).

Doesn't mean it's not overpriced, but that's one reason and you can get a used TI-83/84 for like $30 or less. They pretty much never break.

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1. Okay, the Casio can QR-code-link you to a graph, but if I have internet/smartphone there are better graphing tools anyway, like Desmos.

If you count basic calculus as high school level, TI89's can do symbolic integration. They're usually banned on tests for that exact reason tho.

International Baccalaureate math has some stats questions that require a calculator that can do stats questions. Not really possible by hand in exam conditions!

My favorite cheap Casio is fx-115ES Plus 2nd Edition, $17

https://www.amazon.com/Casio-fx-115ESPLS2-Advanced-Scientifi...

Includes GCD and LCM, some of the newer ones don't have them.

If you want graphing, there is the newish fx-CG100 has a nice display, but they removed Casio basic, it now only has micro Python (way too awkward to type on a tiny keypad):

https://www.amazon.com/Casio-ClassWiz%C2%AE-Calculator-Funct...

The older ones that still have basic:

https://www.amazon.com/Casio-fx-9750GIII-Graphing-Calculator...

BTW, here is a review I made of many calculators, measuring keyboard efficiency: (HP-15c still the best)

https://github.com/jhallen/calculator/wiki

The contrived ones where they make you graph stuff, but that’s about it.

Most of those are counterfeit knockoffs and the buttons are unreliable. It's safer to buy an older, pre-VPAM variant of the 300 or 991 models.

I'm personally a fan of the ti-30xs. Still cheap and a good number of features for looking at data

Generating a QR code to see the graph online is kind of cool, but also kinda dumb too.

I mean, these days kids have smartphones, what's the point of a graphing calculator?

> Show me a highschool math problem you can't do on a $12 Casio scientific like the classic FX-300MS

There isn't one.

The TI-83 is just a $160 tax on every high school student. There is precisely zero use in a graphing calculator before university.

If you ever need a plot of literally any function you'd be plotting in high school, you should be able to do a very quick, very rough approximation by hand. If you can't, you haven't learned the material.

CAS capabilities are prohibited in the SAT: https://satsuite.collegeboard.org/sat/what-to-bring-do/calcu...

Advanced calculators are in an unusual space with external constraints on it. Some of the features or differentiation they add serves the constraint of "if you don't, we won't let students use it in the classroom".

When a calculator is used in a classroom, there's a concern about people using the calculator to replace the skill that's being taught. So, for instance, there's space for a calculator with no CAS, for a class that's trying to teach you to do algebra. That is in some ways easier than "don't use this function of the calculator".

The reason is exam requirements - some professional certifications don’t allow CAS calculators and have other restrictions.

I don't think it's been about costs or CPU for at least 20 years, but isn't it more that for kids to learn to do math, it's better not to have CAS always at hand? So that's why there are some in the lineup without it.

It doesn't help students learn if the tool does everything for them. This isn't a tool for professionals.

Heck, you could do a decent amount with the CAS back in the TI-89.

Honest question: Why do we need physical graphing calculators anymore? Can't this just be a phone app?

That screen resolution for one is horrible for 2026.

"Approved for Exams" make more sense when you take into account the history of the Ti family of calculators.

Why are they still able to sell what is effectively a 30 year old computer for as much or more today than when it came out? Because they managed to get the family informally standardized as "The calculator every teacher in America understands well enough to manage students who use it. Therefore pretty much everything else that could be as or more advanced is effect banned."

It was an amazing piece of kit when it first came out. No doubt you could make something 100x better and 10x cheaper today if someone really tried. But, they would fail commercially because you can't design-in 30 years of legacy in the US school system.

for context

tests like SAT, ACT, and some AP exams are using Desmos, yes

however:

- this means you have to fiddle with a popover window and can't always see the full problem (especially when the reference sheet is also online)

- you have less muscle memory and often take longer

- harder to multitask (you use paper anyways, and the paper to calculator friction is lower than the paper to trackpad friction

- trackpads on school computers are usually worse, which compounds the problem

- some specific functions just don't exist

essentially using Desmos is like using a physical mouse/trackpad, while using your calculator is like using VIM motions and keyboard shortcuts with a concave split keyboard. it's technically more intuitive and can help in certain scenarios, but it's useful to have both.

this sounds trivial, but it's not, especially on tests where you have about or less than a minute per question

ideally you have both a handheld calculator and Desmos though

TIL Desmos. Thanks for the interesting info, seems super cool!

I am from an xUSSR country. And started school shortly after the dissolution. Not only calculators were forbidden in exams, they were forbidden in classes. So calculators in school seems so strange to me.

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Jokes on you, you learned to program.

You’re absolutely right!

…LLM-isms are like nails on chalkboard I swear. Instant turn off the moment I read them.

Even if they’re maybe not lol, doesn’t matter my visceral reaction is negative.

This made me double check if it wasn't someone's vibe code scam website.

156 MHz!!!!

On my favorite designs ever? The first TI-Nspire "battleship" keyboard. Mini alpha-symbol keys in the corners of actual keys. It looked so annoying, but my muscle memory got very good at it.

https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?id=NMAH-DOR2014-05202...

> I was waiting for someone to chime in with "HP is better cuz RPN."

Well, it is ;) The Swiss Micros clones are pretty awesome:

https://www.swissmicros.com/product/dm41x

I bought a DM42n last year. I didn't need it. I don't use it so often that I can justify its purchase. Still, wow, I do so enjoy working with it. It's one of those tools that just feels good to use.

I use emu48 on my phone emulating the HP-50g, which was almost exactly the same size as the phone so my muscle memory somewhat carries over (minus the tactile feedback of a real keyboard). I still have the physical calculator on my desk at home, with no batteries in it so it's only usable within reach of its USB cable.

Anything that goes beyond what that calculator's UI can reasonably handle is going to end up in a Jupyter notebook or something like that.

I collect HP calculators: I have an HP 12C, an HP 15C Collector's Edition (there are a few of them left still for sale), an HP 32Sii, and an HP 48SX. I sometimes use them, but whenever I'm in front of a computer (which is almost all the time), I find myself using the Unix dc command.

Handheld calculators are nice, but outside of exam settings, I could use a smartphone or a computer, though calculators are nice when I want to work distraction-free through something that requires performing calculations. I believe this is why HP largely exited the calculator market: HP's target market was professionals, and cheap computers and smartphones killed the calculator market for them, similar to how electronic calculators killed the slide rule. Texas Instruments, however, is still in the calculator business, largely due to their successful courting of American middle and high schools, as well as ETS and other testing agencies, beginning in the 1990s. I don't know the situation in Japan regarding calculator usage, but I see Casio scientific and graphing calculators proudly displayed at electronics stores such as Yodobashi Camera and Bic Camera.

I use a TI nspire CX CAS.

honestly, I think it makes no sense to spend more than 30$ on a calculator if it can't do symbolic math.

The way you input things like division, integrals, matrix, etc. on newer calculators like the nspire is far superior than the older calculators (eg. ti-84, ti-89, etc.). They look like how you write them on a blackboard instead of relying on purely parentheses or "," and ";" to separate parameters. It's like going from Excel to Mathcad

> What calculators are you guys using that aren't in academia anymore and don't need the "exam approved" limitations?

I still have my TI-85, but I essentially haven't used it since I left college. For 99% of what I need, I use either Python, or what's built into Firefox (e.g. unit conversion), or DDG. For that last 1% (e.g. full CAS functionality), I tend to grab whatever web-based non-AI tool is handy.

The most common way for me to do basic arithmetic is by opening up a Python shell and using it as a calculator. This is what I typically do when I go through my finances every few months and calculate prices for things.

If I’m reaching for calculator, I’m reaching for my phone.

At that point I’m either using the stock iOS calculator or iHP48, HP48 clone.

It mostly depends on which page of apps I’m on and which is closest.

I like the unit conversion on the iOS calculator, easier to use for trivial calcs than the HP.

Biggest gripe on iOS is a single memory. On the HP I’m mostly hooked on the infinite stack, and that’s why I use it over the HP-42 clone app I have as well.

I used to keep my old TI-82 (or was it -84?) from high school and a simpler sturdy solar-powered calculator near my desk, but I realized I always just used either my computer (IRB in the terminal usually) or Apple's calculator app on my phone and never ever touched my physical calculators. So they've now been put in storage.

emacs calc. It's RPN by default, inspired by HP RPN calculators. Also allows algebraic input.

Or often just a python repl

I still use my TI-89 from high school, but I'm interested to find if there are any open hardware/firmware calculator projects with basic engineering tools and a CAS.

Ti89 emulator on my android. Muscle memory from high school and college use is strong.

Honestly, most of the time whatever the newest variant of the TI-30 is ends up being plenty (and what I have at my desk).

Numworks is so much better. According to kids that have access to Ti and HP graphing calculators.

The hardware and software design similarities between this Evo and Numworks is a strong endorsement.

And you can tell that TI pretty clearly copied the NumWorks calculator.

For a $10 BoM and maybe a year of R&D I would say that $160 is bad.

It is an abysmal value. Your corner drugstore sells an AP/SAT approved calculator for $9 to $29.

I will buy one anyway because calculators remain a modest luxury that I want to indulge.

With a CPU 3x faster than a z80, you gotta wonder how many seconds per python instruction.

Absolutely is

I don't have a prime, but agreed on 48gx + dm42n without a doubt. I'd add the 50g as another contender, doesn't depend so much on external memory cards (which have the tendency to fail) and is fairly aligned with the 48/49 line.

They're most definitely trying to ride on the recent anti-technology in school push.

3.5 MB is pretty generous, actually! Some older TI-84 models had MicroPython running on a secondary ATSAMD21 processor with 32 KB of RAM - that was effectively unusable.

Apparently just a TI-84 Evo emulator(?) that you can run in a browser for $20/year:

https://education.ti.com/en/products/calculators/graphing-ca...

My guess is that they are trying to encourage people not to use the various clones and unofficial emulators available for their calculators.

Apparently, you can use it in RPN mode!

With a 156MHz processor and 3.5 megabytes of user-available memory the kids will even learn how to optimize their code!

Electronics engineer here. I use my HP Prime G2 daily in the lab for basic things as well as quickly calculating complicated stuff, since you can pretty much program it to do whatever you want.

You might say why not use Python or Matlab?! It‘s true that you don‘t need a small handheld device to do engineering calculations where there is a ton of other much stronger and free options out there. But the thing is, a calculator is a pure dedication to one thing. You turn it on, you do your calculation, get the answer and move on. It gets out of your way. Plus it is a better feeling to type stuff using the dedicated buttons in a calculator than using a keyboard.

IIRC You don’t use them in the dumb kids class much, you use them a fair amount in the sort of smart class, and you don’t use them much in the actually smart class.

These have been standard equipment (that you buy, or the school loans out) in middle-class US high school math since the 90's (and gone basically unchanged since then). The math books even have content tailored to particular models so that you'll have to buy them instead of alternatives from other vendors.

Those are permitted in schools and even exams in the US, for example. That’s also why they’re often so limited, to make the exam cartels happy.

You may have gone to a poor high school and college. I saw plenty of calculator use in high school and college a long time ago.

It’s got a 3x faster processor brah

Wow, no comment yet for https://xkcd.com/768/

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The biggest ripoffs were the textbooks. Especially the textbooks written by the teachers, themselves, who forced you to buy them.

The cost of these devices isn't the computation, and if anything more connectivity would probably make these more expensive and harder to use (many "smart" devices in classrooms have networking issues and if even one of them can't connect, it hurts the ability to run a lesson). I think standalone computation abilities are pretty important, and connectivity can be a downside for preventing cheating in standardized exams etc.

It doesn’t have a qwerty keyboard. That would be such a pain to type on.

For some reason qwerty keyboard calculators are banned in tests.

ever been to school?

Yes, things that are not LLMs continue to be useful and interesting even though LLMs exist.

I hate what AI hype is doing to peoples' brains here.