Sharp PC-E500S or Sharp PC-G850VS?

[jonmoore]

Hi, I've been through the threads here on the museum forums regarding both of these Sharp models and am currently using pocketemul on Android to assess the PC-E500S model. I would be assessing the G850VS too but this is strewn with unworkable bugs in pocketemul. On the other hand, the PC-E500S emulation is excellent and you're able to set it up to have both 256k internal memory and 256k external RAM card memory - which is super useful as the Sharp is comparable to the HP71B in terms of its internal file system.

You can still pick up a G850VS for a reasonable price, whereas the E500S comes with a heavy premium (much like the 71B), but my gut instinct is to hunt for an E500S in decent condition, but I'm looking for advice regarding this choice.

I'm leaning towards the E500S because I have no interest in assembly language programming and Basic implementation on G850VS appears to be compromised in comparison to the E500S. I have relatively good knowledge of C-like languages but yet again the G850VS implementation of C doesn't appear to have the richness of the mathematical capabilities of the E500S (or the 71B with Math Pac for that matter).

So the key question is whether my instincts are right?

I know the best answer is to get both but I don't think I'm willing to part with that amount of cash (certainly not in one shot), seeing as I'll need to put aside funds for RAM cards and suchlike too.

Any thoughts?