New HP-42S Replacement?

[Thomas Okken]

(09-12-2017 09:07 PM)Carsen Wrote:  Can somebody tell me what makes the HP 42s so fantastic? I have seen pictures of it but I never heard the pros and cons of it.

It's basically an HP-41, without the expansion ports, but with a lot more memory, it's faster, and it has all the HP-15C functionality as well (matrix operations, complex numbers, numerical root finder, numerical integrator), and named variables (not just numbered registers). It's a very well-rounded calculator.

The biggest "con" is the lack of I/O; apart from the keyboard and display, all it has in the I/O department is a one-way infrared printer interface. No bi-directional infrared like the HP-48 series, no serial port, no HP-IL. The only way to get programs into it is typing them.