From: stevev@miser.uoregon.edu (Steve VanDevender)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.hp48
Subject: Re: The "high price" of the HP48!
Date: 1 Jan 93 08:34:45 GMT
Article-I.D.: miser.STEVEV.93Jan1003445
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In-reply-to: phr@telebit.com's message of 1 Jan 93 05:48:54 GMT

In article <PHR.92Dec31214854@napa.telebit.com> phr@telebit.com
(Paul Rubin) writes:

   I don't need to change your mind.  You say later in your article
   that you didn't buy a 48 while you were a student.  That's all
   I've been saying---for a student with very limited cash, a 48
   isn't an important buy, and they shouldn't starve themselves
   or skimp on textbooks or computers in order to own a 48.

So who has been?  Some students may have the money and be able to
justify the expense of an HP 48.  On the other hand, if you can't
buy an HP 48 because you're strapped for cash, that doesn't mean
that you wouldn't have a use for one if you could buy it.

   I feel the 48's processor has become so powerful that one needs
   a decent software development environment to make good use of it.
   If there were compilers etc. for it (like for the 95), it would make 
   more sense, it seems to me.

The Saturn processor is powerful, but specialized.  It was
originally designed to be a low-power processor that could fit in
a small box and be capable of fast arithmetic.  It was not
designed to support compiled high-level languages like C -- it
has a very unusual internal architecture and not much
orthogonality in its instructions and register set.  It has
been adapted to support threaded interpreter languages, such as
FORTH and RPL.

As a programmer and former computer science student, I don't
understand this fixation on compiled languages.  They are good
for applications programming but poor for interactive
problem-solving.  The HP 48 does not need a C compiler to be
useful.  RPL may be unorthodox but it is good for making programs
to solve problems quickly, and because it is interpreted it is
much easier to write and debug.

   How about a 95LX?  A Poqet PC (not sure)?

If you think the HP 48 is too expensive, I don't entirely see how
you would recommend the HP 95LX, at almost twice the price.

The HP 95LX is not a technical calculator.  I have no use for its
business-oriented features.  I can't speak to the Poquet PC but I
am pretty sure it doesn't have as much built-in software of the
HP 95.

I program the demon spawn of the IBM PC for a living right now.
I would rather see them all plummet back to the depths of Hell
where they came from.  As Jan Brittenson put it, the HP 48 and
its Saturn processor have more hack value than the HP 95's
IBM-PC-in-a-tiny-box architecture.  But I digress.

   It is a much more reasonable buy for someone in your position.  Now
   that I'm working full time I've spent larger amounts on more frivolous
   things than an HP48, but as a student (3 months ago, in my case) it
   still seems like it would have been a financially unwise move.

The HP 48 was not available when I was in school.  At the time I
used an HP 41, HP's premier calculator before the HP 48.  I could
easily justify the money I spent on the HP 41, which saved me a
lot of effort in my physics and math classes.

If we imagine that I could have bought an HP 48 while I was a
student, then I might well have.  It would have been a hundred
times better than my HP 41 for the things the HP 41 did for me,
and would have done things for me that my HP 41 could never do.
The HP 48's matrix math and symbolic algebra and calculus
software would have made my second-year calculus classes
significantly easier.  The units management features and HP Solve
would have been a boon in my physics classes.  I could have used
it to test algorithms in computer science classes in class, on
the spot.  You certainly can do many of these things with a home
computer (which I did have), but you can't take the home computer
with you to class.

   You are correct, I probably have kept this up for too long.  But while
   I'm glad for people who are happy with their 48's, I'm still waiting
   to hear how the technical capabilities of the 48 fills an actual need
   of typical college students.  One can be happy with something without
   it filling such a need.  E.g., I'm happy with my stereo system but it
   didn't make me a better student.  If someone posted a message saying
   students in all curricula should have fancy stereo systems, I'd have
   reacted the same way that I did about the 48.

You are blowing someone's off-the-cuff remark way out of
proportion.  Not all students will want or need an HP 48, but
many do.  You seem to think that no one should.

The HP 48 does have a useful combination of features for students
in technical fields.  It has software built-in that you would
have to buy separately for other computers.  It's cheaper than
any palmtop, laptop or home computer that would support the same
features.  It's portable, so you can take it to class, to other
study locations, or to do field work.

If you admit that a technical professional can use an HP 48 on
the job, then a student is going to find it equally useful while
learning the same profession.  A student may use even more
features of the HP 48 during his time in college than a
professional would in his career, since a typical technical
student may take college algebra, calculus, statistics, physics,
and chemistry, while a professional may not use all of those
disciplines in his job.
--
Steve VanDevender 	stevev@greylady.uoregon.edu
"Bipedalism--an unrecognized disease affecting over 99% of the population.
Symptoms include lack of traffic sense, slow rate of travel, and the
classic, easily recognized behavior known as walking."