HP Forum Archive 19

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hp 30b keyboard issue Message #1 Posted by Gerardo Rincon on 19 Mar 2010, 11:33 p.m. I ordered an HP 30b directly from HP (Small Medium Business Dept.) When the calculator arrived, the #4 key in the keyboard was damaged (no click) it was depressed and it was hard to press to produce the #4 in the screen. I called HP (Small Med Bus dpt) and they were very nice about it and sent me a replacement. When the replacement arrived, same problem again but now with the "." (period) key. I called again and they are sending me another exchange. Is this a coincidence to get two calculators with bad keyboard keys? Has any one else experience similar issues with 30b keyboards? I have to say HP has been VERY nice about exchanging the units, great service. But I just rather have a 100% good calculator....

Re: hp 30b keyboard issue Message #2 Posted by Bruce Bergman on 20 Mar 2010, 2:22 a.m., in response to message #1 by Gerardo Rincon I have four of the 30b's, including two that came last week, and none of them have a keyboard problem. There were a couple issues with that very bottom row, but they were fixed. I'd guess you probably just hit a bad spot. What were the serial numbers? Thanks, Bruce

Re: hp 30b keyboard issue Message #3 Posted by Gerardo RIncon on 20 Mar 2010, 8:21 a.m., in response to message #2 by Bruce Bergman YOu are probably correct - the serial numbers are similar... 4CY00300075 and 4CY00300024 .. they are 51 calculators from each other?

Re: hp 30b keyboard issue Message #4 Posted by Joe Burwell on 23 Mar 2010, 6:02 p.m., in response to message #3 by Gerardo RIncon I purchased two HP 30b calculators and have not had a problem. The serial number on one of them is 4CY00300074.

Re: hp 30b keyboard issue Message #5 Posted by Gerardo Rincon on 23 Mar 2010, 9:25 p.m., in response to message #4 by Joe Burwell Update: I just received replacement calculator from HP and is all good! All Keys work correctly. Serial # 4CY00300040. It may have been a random error. Edited: 23 Mar 2010, 9:27 p.m.

Re: hp 30b keyboard issue Message #6 Posted by Walter B on 24 Mar 2010, 1:54 a.m., in response to message #5 by Gerardo Rincon Congratulations! Nevertheless, pulling two random errors of one kind out of a production featuring a gross error probability of - let's guess - significantly less than 0.1% is very improbable, i.e. much less than 1ppm. So, your experience should make us wondering - especially those folks who know the production numbers.

Re: hp 30b keyboard issue Message #7 Posted by Dave Shaffer (Arizona) on 24 Mar 2010, 12:57 p.m., in response to message #6 by Walter B The real question should perhaps become: "is it really a random error?" When you take most probablility and statistics courses, you spend the semester considering only proper statitical problems. However, when the probability gets too low, maybe it is time to think different thoughts. i.e. if you roll a dice (without looking too closely at it), and you get a 5 twenty time in a row, perhaps it is time to inspect the dice more closely!! You are more likely to have a loaded dice than to have actually rolled the same number 20 times at random. Here, there may well have been a production glitch that comparably affected a bunch of machines.

Re: hp 30b keyboard issue Message #8 Posted by Walter B on 24 Mar 2010, 6:33 p.m., in response to message #7 by Dave Shaffer (Arizona) Hi Dave, that's exactly what I wanted to initiate :) Two random errors in a row are very improbable. We may only speculate about the true cause, however, since nobody but the people close to this production have all the information.

Re: hp 30b keyboard issue Message #9 Posted by Tim Wessman on 20 Mar 2010, 10:08 a.m., in response to message #1 by Gerardo Rincon Please send me an email. I'll probably be wanting those to look at. Apart from some very early issues due to really bad warping in the plastic while the process was getting set up (very normal), this would be the very first keyboard issue. TW

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