HP Forum Archive 20

[ Return to Index | Top of Index ]

Not HP but I want one Message #1 Posted by Paul Dale on 28 July 2011, 8:08 p.m. This is a great idea: Wrongulator. Maybe the 34S should have a "wrong" mode added :-) - Pauli

Re: Not HP but I want one Message #2 Posted by Michael de Estrada on 28 July 2011, 8:51 p.m., in response to message #1 by Paul Dale Looks like the calculator equivalent of a whoopee cushion.

Re: Not HP but I want one Message #3 Posted by Egan Ford on 29 July 2011, 11:51 a.m., in response to message #1 by Paul Dale Evil redefined! And it's black.

Re: Not HP but I want one Message #4 Posted by Neil Hamilton (Ottawa) on 29 July 2011, 1:10 p.m., in response to message #1 by Paul Dale This reminds me of the "gifts" that get passed out by vendors at technical seminars. Such as the USB memory stick I got who's activity LED would go out when the thing was actively writing/reading -- the exact opposite of what the 1 page instruction sheet said it did, or the original 486sx's with the broken floating point unit (now that was a clever "Say, how about we do this!?" over a few beers on a Friday afternoon!) -- or was that just an urban myth? I suspect some marketing-type (no offense intended toward marketing-types -- some of my best friends are marketing-types -- I would just be sad if my sister/brother married one :-) figured that they would make the best of a bad situation and try and sell a dud design anyway. Kind of clever actually.

Re: Not HP but I want one Message #5 Posted by PeterP on 1 Aug 2011, 2:39 p.m., in response to message #4 by Neil Hamilton (Ottawa) no urban myth. I had one of them...

Re: Not HP but I want one Message #6 Posted by Norman Dziedzic on 29 July 2011, 4:02 p.m., in response to message #1 by Paul Dale This reminds me of a story a friend of mine told me. His family had a small business and right before he left on vacation he altered the keys on a standard desktop "10-key" calculator. Normally they sit 1-2-3 bottom row and up to 7-8-9 on the top. He swapped the top and bottom rows to look like a phone kyepad. He thought he'd get a good laugh when he got back and did...especially when he found out his father had sent it out for service and the manufacturer said they couldn't figure out what was wrong with it!! :-)

Re: Not HP but I want one Message #7 Posted by Lode on 29 July 2011, 4:34 p.m., in response to message #1 by Paul Dale One that always gives 80085 as an answer could be called the "Boobulator"!

Re: Not HP but I want one Message #8 Posted by spb on 30 July 2011, 6:59 a.m., in response to message #1 by Paul Dale Quote: Maybe the 34S should have a "wrong" mode added :-) The Soviet-era Elektronika MK-54 had an `Error' button. The Elektronika MK-52 (not 54) is a fairly well-known calculator; it was used as a backup onboard the Soyuz missions. It was replaced by the MK-61, which was designed to be functionally identical to the MK-52 but have a different form factor (the 61 being a Pioneer to the 52's Voyager). Similarly, the MK-54 was designed to be functionally equivalent to the earlier B3-34, which was a hugely popular early Soviet programmable. But for some reason or other---presumably to save manufacturing costs---the MK-54 used exactly the same body as the MK-61. This might make sense until you realise that the MK-61, like the MK-52, has two shift keys while the B3-34 has only one. So the MK-54 ends up with a shift key it literally has no use for. As a result, using it as a prefix before any other function yields an immediate `Error'; an error button.

[ Return to Index | Top of Index ]

Go back to the main exhibit hall