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> I’m sure it has been decades since it was last used, but I plugged it into the wall, cycled the on/off switch a few times and there it was—a bright, red 0. Th
by rob74 2y ago
> I’m sure it has been decades since it was last used, but I plugged it into the wall, cycled the on/off switch a few times and there it was—a bright, red 0. The calculator is now 45 years old, but it still works.
Ah, so you could connect this pocket calculator to mains power? Guess it shows that I'm from the generation who grew up with LCD-equipped calculators, which could run for years with two button cells...
- adrian_b 2y agoSince he mentions a bright red 0, that indicates a calculator with a LED display. The early calculators, which had either LED or vacuum fluorescent displays, could use either a few R6 cylindrical batteries or an external power supply, like a laptop today. When close to a wall plug, it was normal to use it, because the lifetime of the batteries was modest, mostly due to the high power consumption of the display. While this was a disadvantage, bright and fast VFD displays were much more appealing than the dull and slow LCD displays that have replaced them a few years later. I believe that HP has used only LED displays at that time and not VFDs, because they manufactured the LED themselves, unlike other calculator vendors.
- fsckboy 2y ago>The early calculators, which had either LED or vacuum fluorescent displays nickel-cadmium has entered the chat, installed first in the HP-35!