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HP Forum Archive 21

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HP-30b discontinued?
Message #1 Posted by Walter B on 8 Sept 2012, 5:00 p.m.

In an email of today, Richard Nelson claims the HP-30b being discontinued. Is there any further evidence for (or against) that claim? We've heard so often about its end - I doubt it, since I don't see any successor yet.

      
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #2 Posted by Reth on 8 Sept 2012, 5:10 p.m.,
in response to message #1 by Walter B

I have no any information about that, but it sounds logical, as an attempt to kill the WP-34S and further incarnations of it.

Edited: 8 Sept 2012, 5:11 p.m.

            
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #3 Posted by Patrice on 8 Sept 2012, 6:10 p.m.,
in response to message #2 by Reth

I should have missed something !

For every WP-34S, they sell a calc ! The more successful the WP-34S, the more they sell.

Patrice

                  
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #4 Posted by Mark Scheuern on 8 Sept 2012, 7:25 p.m.,
in response to message #3 by Patrice

Agreed, that would make no sense Plus, presumably they're selling them to people who want to use them as a 30b as well. And HP has them listed as in stock here.

                        
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #5 Posted by Walter B on 9 Sept 2012, 5:53 a.m.,
in response to message #4 by Mark Scheuern

Ok, thanks for your responses. So it seems the number of reliable sources decrements by one.

                              
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #6 Posted by Howard Owen on 9 Sept 2012, 10:11 p.m.,
in response to message #5 by Walter B

Richard has a long (40+ years) history of finding out what's really going on inside HP's calculator efforts. That doesn't mean he can't be mistaken, but I wouldn't count him out too quickly.

I wonder what might be in the wings as a replacement for the 30B? :) I'm not going to HHC this year, so I'll have to wait to find out like everyone else.

Regards,
Howard.

      
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #7 Posted by Patrice on 10 Sept 2012, 3:23 a.m.,
in response to message #1 by Walter B

20b and 30b are still on sell on French site
http://www8.hp.com/fr/fr/products/calculators/index.html?facet=Financial but it is possible than they have only stock to sell.

Patrice

      
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #8 Posted by Marcus von Cube, Germany on 10 Sept 2012, 11:51 a.m.,
in response to message #1 by Walter B

AFAIK, the ATMEL processor is phased out and the manufacturer presses its customers to switch to a different chip. Any speculations about WP-34S in this respect seem ridiculous.

            
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #9 Posted by Katie Wasserman on 10 Sept 2012, 2:52 p.m.,
in response to message #8 by Marcus von Cube, Germany

I don't see that on the Atmel site, it looks like the AT91SAM7L128 is still in production. EOL of this chip would mean that all the ARM-based HP calculators would need to be re-worked or obsoleted, this would be particularly bad for the flagship HP-12C.

On the other had it would give the calculator guys a chance to fix the bugs.

                  
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #10 Posted by Tim Wessman on 10 Sept 2012, 2:59 p.m.,
in response to message #9 by Katie Wasserman

The non-packaged part only unless I am remembering wrong.

TW

Edited: 10 Sept 2012, 2:59 p.m.

                        
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #11 Posted by uhmgawa on 12 Sept 2012, 1:51 a.m.,
in response to message #10 by Tim Wessman

Quote:
The non-packaged part only unless I am remembering wrong.

I received feedback from Atmel about a year ago, captured here relative to the sam7 12c and 15c. The latter is/was being produced with a minor pcb mod to accommodate the lqfp packaged sam7, perhaps as a contingency to the die being EOL. It was also the pcb version I'd used to derive the service schematic. The accessible package should be quite welcome to most anyone who finds they have unfinished business inside.

No idea what sort of contracted agreement HP may have w/r/t supply continuation of the die form. And while a modified 30b pcb layout is pretty trivial, it will likely drag the product again through the joys of regulatory approval in its current markets.

            
Re: HP-30b discontinued?
Message #12 Posted by Paul Dale on 10 Sept 2012, 11:20 p.m.,
in response to message #8 by Marcus von Cube, Germany

This doesn't bode well for the longevity of the 34S :-(

- Pauli

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