HP-10 my last missing piece

[PANAMATIK]

Some days ago I aquired an HP-10 on a well known platform. This rare piece was the last missing calculator in my HP collection. The price was a tough 199,- Euro.

When it arrived today I was very curious and inserted new batteries, switched ON, and was very disappointed, because the display showed only some segments and the motor made terrible noise and run endlessly against the right end. No reaction of the keyboard. My thought was, this is an unrepairable damage of the electronics.

Then I disassembled it and carefully stacked the PCBs together again. To my great surprise the display came up, the keyboard did run, and I was able to calculate. The next step was to insert paper and as you can see in the image, it also prints!



If the HP-10 electronics is damaged, I see no chance to repair it, because it doesn't contain an ACT chip, nor the HP-10 microcode is available. It can't be read out of the single chip inside with normal means. I would not have been able to make a replacement chip, not to mention the work, that would have been accompanied with it.

Now I'm very happy, and this concludes my collection of HP calculators.

Bernhard