Shop For TI-30XS Multiview Calculator

After using CAS calculators for 10 years (hp48g,hp50g,ti92p), I couldn't use any scientific calculator, they were too simplistic (even if they had a lot of features) - UNTIL THIS CALCULATOR CAME ALONG. The calculation history is implemented just like on ti92plus. You need a number from the previous calculations? Just "up" to it, and paste it into your new calculation you're typing. And you can do this as many times as needed. Just grab the numbers from previous calculations and assemble new calculations. This works REALLY well for any involved problems (chemistry, physics, etc.)

Now here come the gripes. The scientific notation is HORRIBLY implemented. Instead of "E" button to represent "x10^", it has an actual "x10^" button, which types "x10^" for you (you can do it without the button, by typing X 1 0 ^). So what's the problem?

Here's an example: what's 8Mega/3kilo?. On most scientific calculator this would look like this "8e6/3e3". On the ti30, however, this has to look like this "8x10^6/(3x10^3)". Maybe it's more proper, but it's a lot messier, and you also MUST use parenthesis for the denominator (in order to make sure that the exponents are kept in the denominator as well), or you can use fractions (which are just as many keystrokes). The only way to make sure that the exponent part stays with the value is to put parenthesis around each scientific value. What I end up doing when doing calculations with any scientific notation is putting parenthesis around EVERY number. It's dumb.

I'm not sure why TI did this. It looks much more cumbersome and much more difficult to interpret and review. "8e6/3e3" is right to the point, but TI engineers thought that "8x10^6/(3x10^3)" is much clearer.

To compare it to other calculators
I still like this calculator much more than the casio es115 or sharp w516. They're all great calculators though (that have more features, like numeric integration, instant differentials, matricies and imaginary - I argue against those features in scientific calculators, because they're so poorly implemented in comparison to how they're implemented on true CAS calculators like HP50g or tiVoyage). HP35 (hp33 is very similar) is a very specialized machine, I'd only recommend it to people that are used to HP machines, and need programming capability; to most other normal people it's as unintuitive as it gets (even RPN implementation is pretty strange in comparison to HP-28S,48,50 series).Get more detail about TI-30XS Multiview Calculator.