Re: Thread for 15c LE delivery reports Message #95 Posted by Ed Look on 14 Sept 2011, 12:30 a.m., in response to message #86 by James Sterbenz
Mine came today, but when I got home, I had errands to run. I didn't get to open it until a few hours ago.
My teenager asked, "What is it, Dad?"
"A calculator."
"..." (and probably rolled his eyes, too.)
"Hey! I always wanted this calculator, but it had been discontinued for about twenty years!"
"Oh."
"I didn't get it because I still a working older calculator and really couldn't afford another one then. And now, I have another chance to have one!"
"..." (probably shrugged before he turned and left.)
And later on, my wife: "Another one!??"
Oh, and it came with no problems in a plastic padded envelope. The plastic outer transparent box that bears the lettering and logo came with one flap bent slightly so that the cover flap will not completely close... BUT WHO CARES ABOUT THAT!!
The 15C LE itself was in fine condition and as others have said, feels solid. Yeah, maybe there was a slight rattle or movement in the f and g shift keys, but that's really to me a nonissue. It feels nice in my hands as I use it. I already typed in my quickie, short program to convert between eV and wavelength; and, I found it is no longer all that short. I forgot that keystroke programming for the 15C, 34C, etc. employed not the name/function of the keys as steps, but their position on the keyboard matrix! Now, it all comes back to me, the feeling I had when I used to program the 34C all those many years ago. (Okay, okay, so the keys don't QUITE feel as solid and snappy as the Spice and original Voyager ones did, it's still rather satisfactory to me.)
Oh, and for those who may be interested, the serial number on the bottom of the metal plate on the back reads, 01526 and on the little white sticker on top, CNA13207Q9.
As I was keying in my little program, it had been so many years that I forgot which key opened programming mode and had to look it up in the included manual, which is quite nice, except that today, I had gotten very little sleep and my eyes worse than they even are normally, and so I found the print a bit on the light side. For those who might miss the old spiral bound versions, my HP-34C manual, which is the original spiral bound one, after so many years shows signs of the cover beginning to wear off the spiral spine, if not any of the pages.
I also need a few physical constants, and I instinctively scanned the keyboard for an entryway to the constants or equation library, forgetting that in those days of mucho expensive memory chips, you had to write your own libraries, as programs. (So I cheated; I turned on the 50g and looked up the numbers to key into the 15C LE.)
But these are attributable to my aging habits rather than anything having to do with the calculator itself. I'd love to pop this in my briefcase and use it as my work scientific calc, except I'd need a sturdier, more robust case. Unfortunately for me, at the price of this rather nice calculator, I can't get another one to leave there or carry around.
Still, to have a 15C after all these years, after missing out on the opportunity back then...
... sweet!!
Edited: 14 Sept 2011, 12:52 a.m.
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