Re: Calculators banned by NCEES Message #8 Posted by CME750 on 10 Jan 2004, 6:49 p.m., in response to message #4 by Brent
For most long-time HP-41 and HP-48 users, the issue is not the loss of advanced calculator features. The real issue is whether they can continue to use RPN.
Your advice is to "prepare for the test with the tools you have available to you". Fair enough, but what tools are available? Not the HP- 33S, unfortunately. The NCEES calculator ban was announced in August 2003. It's now January 2004, and you still can't buy a 33S. Until the 33S is something more than vaporware, this is really no choice at all.
So what else is available? Well, you could spend $200-300 for an old 32SII, 15C, or 11C (hope you didn't buy a 41, since these have just been added to the banned list). But that seems like quite an investment for a used calculator that is only needed for one 8-hour exam.
Or you could buy an HP9G, 9S, 30S, or even a Casio, TI, or Sharp. And retrain yourself to use a clumsy and inferior system after years (or decades) of using RPN.
These are all lousy choices. As it happens, I personally don't have to worry about it -- I have a 32SII, which is on the current NCEES "approved" list, and I am using it to prepare for the PE exam. But I am sympathetic to others (like Dave, the original poster in this thread) who do have to face this choice.
The blame for this unfortunate situation lies with HP, as well as with NCEES. HP has no trouble making inexpensive NCEES-compliant scientific calculators: the current-model 9G, 9S, and 30S all fill the bill. But for whatever reason, they can't seem to provide one that uses RPN.
NCEES also banned TI graphing calculators, but there has been little whining from TI owners, because NCEES-compliant algebraic scientific calculators are readily available at low cost. There is currently no such alternative for RPN scientifics. If HP had kept the 32SII in production through 2003, there would have been far less griping.
Edited: 11 Jan 2004, 12:31 a.m. after one or more responses were posted
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