35s with a broken Enter key... worth repairing?

[Ron Ross]

While the Wp 34s may be a solution, it is built upon an Hp 30B which ain't the best. I like its size better than the Hp 35s, but I am not certain its build quality is as good as the Hp 35s.

And why is she using an Hp 35s? Is it because she is in an engineering school and is restricted to NCEES approved calculators. If that is the case, you should revert back the Hp 35s.

If she isn't restricted and it sounds like she isn't and she likes the Hp 50G, I would suggest she adopts that calculator instead. It is far more capable than the Hp 35s. It actually has the enter key IN THE RIGHT PLACE, if you ain't a dinosaur and know better.

Another calculator for consideration is the Hp Prime. It is actually a lot better built than anything Hp has made in at least 10 years, maybe more. It is a quality calculator with a color touch screen and targeted at the educational market. However while it does have an RPN mode, in RPN mode it is not nearly as versatile, in fact it almost seems crippled even though they put a wide enter key midway up, so it pretends to look like a legitimate RPN machine.

But it won't replace an Hp 50g for number crunching power, if I had to choose one for school for myself, I would grab the Hp 50G and If I am not pressed for time, I kinda like the old Hp 48G's, but they are slow, especially for a student who may actually use the graphing capabilities. I often use an Hp 48g due to the keyboard compared to the Hp 50G, but if I weren't biased and were starting out, the Hp 50g has so much more and is much faster.

I just recently finished a class in Power Flow and I must agree, nothing beats an Hp 42s for shear number crunching and adaptability for an EE class. My Hp 48G felt clumsy in comparison for the kind of calculations I could crank out with my customized 42.