HP Forum Archive 19

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HP-46 find Message #1 Posted by GanjaTron on 29 Jan 2009, 5:48 p.m. Today I did a good deed: I rescued an HP-46 from the dumpster. No kidding, the lab was actually gonna toss it out! I fired it up and it's perfect -- even the ribbon still prints. This thing is weird; apart from its hefty weight and size, it has the peculiarity of running a loud motor when you turn on the printer, almost giving the impression there's a hard disk lurking within! And man, is that printer clunky; reminds me of a telex machine! Anyway, just thought I'd share that with you guys. Wonder what's gonna turn up next in the dumpster... ;^) --Roland

Re: HP-46 find Message #2 Posted by bill platt on 29 Jan 2009, 7:08 p.m., in response to message #1 by GanjaTron I think I speak for many of us who spend time here when I say congratulations!

Re: HP-46 find Message #3 Posted by Michael de Estrada on 29 Jan 2009, 8:01 p.m., in response to message #1 by GanjaTron Does it have the optional LED display? I remember lusting over one of these in the display case of a store in 1974.

Re: HP-46 find Message #4 Posted by George Bailey (Bedford Falls) on 30 Jan 2009, 4:07 a.m., in response to message #3 by Michael de Estrada Quote: Does it have the optional LED display? I just read about this machine on this museum page. How was it operated without the LED option? Was every single keystroke directly printed?

Re: HP-46 find Message #5 Posted by GanjaTron on 30 Jan 2009, 6:42 a.m., in response to message #3 by Michael de Estrada Yep, it does have the LED option. The dinky display looks pretty out of place on such a large machine. The printer doesn't echo every keystroke, only when you enter operands or operators, so I suspect the absent display is no fun. Amusingly, hitting CLEAR literally prints the same. Anyone know why it uses a black and *red* ribbon? Regards, --Roland

Re: HP-46 find Message #6 Posted by Katie Wasserman on 30 Jan 2009, 8:14 a.m., in response to message #5 by GanjaTron Quote: Anyone know why it uses a black and *red* ribbon? Negative numbers print in red.

Re: HP-46 find Message #7 Posted by bill platt on 30 Jan 2009, 10:35 a.m., in response to message #6 by Katie Wasserman I think that red ribbon will see a lot of use these days.

Re: HP-46 find Message #8 Posted by GanjaTron on 30 Jan 2009, 1:13 p.m., in response to message #6 by Katie Wasserman Quote: Negative numbers print in red. Thanks Katie, you're right. Wasn't in a "negative" mood to try it out until now. ;^) The red's kinda faded tho. That grinding printer noise really freaks me out. And yep, these calcs with their red negs might just come into fashion again these days... Have a great weekend, --Roland

Re: HP-46 find Message #9 Posted by Katie Wasserman on 30 Jan 2009, 5:14 p.m., in response to message #8 by GanjaTron New black/red ribbons are very easy to come by as this seems to be a standard size still in use in modern accountant's calculators. (I think I bought some of these: Porelon 483-B/R). I might start selling red-only ribbons, there must be some money in that these days. They say that many law firms have switched from doing real estate deals to doing bankruptcies.

Re: HP-46 find Message #10 Posted by Walter B on 30 Jan 2009, 5:23 p.m., in response to message #9 by Katie Wasserman Quote: They say that many law firms have switched from doing real estate deals to doing bankruptcies. If you meant what you wrote then that was a real good joke. But I guess you did mean something different ;-)

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