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I have heard that the HP49G+ is the next best calculator to the TI-89. I've read a few comparison sites before on them, so I'll guess I'll have to see what this one has to say.
Oh, the TI-89 Platium may beat it a little, with the added extra memory and USB support (even though that's ALL that they added).

Just based on the information the site mentioned in this artcle, I've made a few conclusions:
As far as the hardware goes, the HP49G+ beats the TI-89, especially with the use of the expandable memory card. But as for the OS, software, programming, and third-party support, other than the G+ doing calculations faster than the 89, in my opinion, the TI-89 is better (but I'm biased).
At any rate, they're both very good and powerful calculators. I just think the interface of the TI-89 is better looking. :)

But how much memory does one really need on a calculator? Personally, I never really used that much more memory on my 83+ silver than my regular 83+. Would an SD card really be that much more useful? If you complain about not having enough memory to run games, just delete some of them. Games aren't that necessary. Well, that's at least what I do...

I can say that it may be useful. My HP-49g+ has the entire KJV of the bible on it (~2.5mb compressed, see http://www.geocities.com/timwessman/) to use with an E-book reader. Shortly I will be publishing a 45000 word spanish to english, eng 2 spanish translator with more languages to come. So yes, there are things you can't do with smaller memory. It is also very nice to avoid having to plug anything in. Just pop the card into the card reader, load the ROM onto there, upgrade the calc, backup the ENTIRE calc (flash and all) and reload it, etc.

Real comparison between the TI89 titanium Voyage200PLT and the CASIOCLASSPAD300
find TIvsCASIOclassPad300.htm in
geocities.com / jaimezacalcs

The failure of the CASIOCLASSPAD300 this in which the real keyboard cannot operate in the totality the system,
obligatorily requires to use the pen Touch.
The design that I have created exchange the history of this calculator, so that worker with or without the Pen Touch

Jaime Fernando Meza Meza

gziped, the Project Guetenburg KJV Bible is about 1 MB. I have often thought about writing an "online bible" type of program for the 83+se, but I have other projects going on now.

MWM

I saw an eBook Bible for a TI calculator here, also... however, you couldn't fit all of the files on the calculator at one time. Fitting the whole Bible on your calculator is huge... just imagine... all that text.

I've used that Bible before...however I don't particularly like the KJV...I got the NIV New Testament and Psalms and Proverbs. It's been pretty useful, however some way of storing the WHOLE thing on my calc instead of just The Gospels would be helpful. With nothing else in memory, I could only fit Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, 1+2 Corinthians, Hebrews, and 1+2 Peter. Strange selections? I was in Teen Bible Quizzing.. :) This larger memory would be a great help. However I REALLY like the TICT's (I believe it is theirs, correct me if I'm wrong) Ebook Reader. It would be a shame if they didn't have something similar for HP....

KJV is definitely too hard to read. Oh yeah, I think that eBook program is great. Using it is a lot better than storing everything as text files.

Yeah, I don't like KJV either, so I made a bunch of NIV notefolio's for the 83SE. So far I've got psalms, proverbs, job, john, corinthians, galatians-phillipians, thessalonians, timothy, james, 1-3 johns, and a couple more. I don't know if Notefolio is more compact than ebook, but it is definitely more compact than Nifty (though you can flip through pages with Nifty, but you have to scroll line by line with Notefolio, so long files take a really long time to get the bottom, unless you do a "find:"). I'd like to publish them, but I don't think it's legal (darn copyright laws)

512MB beats 2.7MB any day. However, 2.7MB is sufficient to fit a good amount of stuff on your calc. (I'm referring to the TI-89 Ti with the 2.7MB... correct me if I'm wrong, but the regular TI-89 only has ~700K, right?)

Titanium. Not Platinum. Titanium.

Either my bias is showing, or the site was biased, because I got the feeling that he thought the 89 sucked compared to the HP. But it don't make no nevermind to me, cuz I want an 89 either way.

Hi,

Can you please let me know how the review is biased?

I am willing to correct any mistakes - but you have to let me know what I've done wrong first! :-)

What do you like most about the TI? I'm open to suggestions to improve the review.

here are more mathematical programs for the TI then on TICalc.org, but they are harder to hunt down.

but these methods are slower then the version below.

should be a 'than' in those places ;)

Also, in TI-Basic for 68K, you can type in all the functions with the keyboard.

I personally didn't see anything biased about it, good work ;)

rather then entering the whole equation at once.

than instead of then again ;)

Also, you mention the Voyage 200, but not the 92(+)

That's because the Voyage 200 is better than the 92/+...same features (screen size and icon toolbars), but it (almost) fits in your pocket. He also did mention QWERTY keboards were ruled out, so I say he did a great job. Also, I'm not sure, but I believe they have a similar thing to this at technoplaza.net...not sure if its the 49g PLUS but it does do the 49g...

Might I also suggest an inclusion of the linking software available for each? I seem to remember hearing that the HP calculators use Z-modem transfers or something, TI-89's mainly have the options of TILP, the Graphlink software, or the TI Connect software

They use standard USB. You need the driver. If you have IrDA that works as well. Currently no other programs are availible besides the HP one. An SD card reader also does the job much quicker.

You should mention the durability of the two. I know that the 89 in general is very durable, ive dropped mine many times and it is fine, but i know nothing about if the HP is just as durable, or would crack into a 449! pieces if it is handled by anyone who did not thouroughly wash and moisturize their hands first :)

I have personally seen 3 89s die after recieveing heavy blows. I have seen 1 49g die. i was the cause of two of those deaths as my friend and I i a rather stupid experiment decided to see how the 89 and 49 would fare alling our of a third story window. hey, we won them for free and were feeling rather stupid. . . =) (as a side note, the 89 died on the first try, the 49 took 3)

well, then i guess that answers my question. They both are pretty durable. I expect that there is more chance of damage if the calc falls with the LCD down, as it will probably crack, but if the bottom hits, it might not be as damaged.

Actually the first 2 89s that died had something fall on the screen. The g+ has a very durable clear plastic cover that protects it from wear. Mine rides aound in my backpack, 2 months now and not a visible scatch on the screen cover.

I keep my TI-89 in my backpack all the time and it's never gotten a scratch either...

Hey! You could have given at least one of them to me!

What sort of surface did they fall on?

MWM

Concrete, at 3am in the morning from a hotel. Like I said we were being stupid.

What was the temperature? How about wind speed? ... or the relative humidity? Was the Barometric pressure rising or falling?

MWM

Nice review. I have an 89 and a 49G (not +), and I use both equally. (But I use my slide rule more. :) )

The screen cover on the 49G gets dust underneath it, which is *very* annoying because I can't clean it out.

I also like the 89 better because I can take it apart with two screwdrivers, whereas the 49G is welded together (plastic rivets, actually, but there's little difference).

The 49 has annoying rubber keys that tire one's fingers because they need more force to press.

The 89 has a program called "EQW" which works just like the one in the 49. (Available on ticalc.org, naturally.)

Other than that, I prefer the 49 because it's easier to use and weighs more.

<<The 89 has a program called "EQW" which works just like the one in the 49. (Available on ticalc.org, naturally.)>>

It should not be available on ticalc.org.

Why not?

Just a wild guess, but maybe IT WAS NOT UPLOADED?

btw, that comment was not meant to be rude. If you found that rude in any way, tell me, and I'll try to be more... tactful in my replies.

Well, it may not have been uploaded but you can download it from the author's website (follow the Web Page link). You can also get the flash app version from TI's website at http://education.ti.com

Umm, that's my website, not the author's :) But yeah, distribution of EQW from other sites is not allowed without permission from the author (E.W.).

>>>"Just a wild guess, but maybe IT WAS NOT UPLOADED?"

I figured that much, I was just wondering WHY it wasn't uploaded... and a few posts down this thread it has the answer, and I guess that makes sense, but I personally think that if somebody makes a program, they should upload it to ticalc.org as well. Otherwise, it gets much less publicity.

I don't upload everything to ticalc because I enjoy making people go to my site.


-Samuel S

The guy might be confused as there is an old version of the Hail expression writer available on ticalc.

The one and ONLY cheerio:
-Samuel S

IMHO, Hail is better than EQW, since it has more features. Of course, EQW does have some features Hail doesn't. And Hail gives a Memory error when I try to access VAR-LINK. Even in low memory mode.

49g+ is going back to plastic keys WOOHOO!!!

About a month ago I emailed you telling you that the processor in the HW2 TI-89 is not a custom MC68000 but rather a perfectly standard MC68SEC000. Why did you not correct this?

Oops, sorry. I was very busy with some other stuff then, and my webpage wasn't a priority. I'll update the page with some other corrections in a few hours.

Your site is good, although you fail to mention TIGCC, which is much better than TI Flash Studio in terms of... uh... Well, it's better. Ask anyone.

Oh, and a post reminded me, there's an easier way to make a factorial function on a TI-89:

:fact(x)
:x!

Or, if you don't like optimizations:

:fact(x)
:Func
:x!
:EndFunc

Or no optimizations at all:

:fact(x)
:Func
:(C)ARGS: X, RETURNS X!
:Return x!
:EndFunc

And THIS one has a cool comment when you look it up on Catalog!

Well...yeah...but that kinds of defeats the purpose :-)

Well, I just found it odd that you'd use a slower method to calculate a factorial as opposed to the faster way. I've never actually tested this... if just typing x! is faster than fac(x), it's probably THAT much faster, but I'd think that x! should be faster. Eh, whatever.

It's not faster. There's no point in making a factorial program. It's like making a Quadratic Formula solver on the TI-89: You do the same thing the system does, only 100x less efficiently.

No, I'm not saying the AMS is efficient.

generally, the only time you would do a factorial is a time when you do many factorials, so i just copy and paste the "!", and it makes it rather quick. You could also make a custom menu that has factorial on it.

The menu is a good idea... however, pressing [Diamond] then "E" is much faster, for me. It comes automatically when I'm typing. If you didn't know the [Diamond], "E" shortcut, it really helps. If you did, then I guess I didn't tell you anything that you didn't already know. But anyway, if you do it enough, you'll type it without thinking, just as you would with any other key combination.
BTW, I used the factorial key a LOT in algebra for permutations and all that stuff.

somehow i had completely forgotten (over the summer) about the un-printed diamond shortcuts. Thanks for reminding me, that'll definitely be helpful, especially on the SAT tomorrow...

I hope you mean [diamond][/]; saying [d][e] is rather confusing, as some people would press [d][EE(scientific notation)] and get that list.

OK, I guess that was a bit unclear.

What I wanted to do was show how to make a simple program on both calculators. I could have chosen something complicated that both calculators lacked, but I think that would have been needlessly confusing.

Factorial is a nice simple function, so I chose that.

The speed comparision was an afterthought. I just wanted to see if there was a difference in programming speed between both machines.

If you would like to contribute a more interesting TI program and time it, then be my guest :-)

>>The speed comparision was an afterthought.

You are pitting an itterative process on the hp against a recursive function on the ti and you expect a speed comparison to have ANY relevance?


Anoyed at stupidity:

-Samuel S

Theres no reason for rudeness. As I wrote on the website

"Note that this is a recursive solution - an iterative one might be slightly faster. If you can write a faster routine in TI-basic, feel free to send it to me. "

That comment still stands - no-one has sent in a faster solution. If you write one, please post it here.

Al

>>"Note that this is a recursive solution - an iterative one might be slightly faster. If you can write a faster routine in TI-basic, feel free to send it to me. "


It is for this comment that I am being rude. You compare apples to oranges, admit it, then proclaim in this sentence that it hey, it probably doesn't matter at all.

>>That comment still stands - no-one has sent in a faster solution. If you write one, please post it here.

Hey I expect you to do your homework.



-Samuel S

Since you insisted...

I have written an iterative solution, and it is actually *worse* then the recursive solution. 298! takes 21 seconds to display on a clean TI-89. The code is:

---
fac(x) : Func : Local val : Local total
1->total : For val, 1, x : val * total -> total
EndFor : Return Total : EndFunc
---

Note that I'm not exactly an expert TI basic programmer, so I'm sure this can be written better. So far it looks like the recursive speeds are about the same, with the HP winning by a few percent. When an iterative solution is used, the TI takes more then 3 times the HP to display the result. Bizarre.

I'll update the page later. Comments anyone?

cheers,

Al

might it be faster to do:

:1->total
:For val,x,1,-1
:total * val->total
:EndFor

Maybe im just being silly, but this way you wont end up with a really big number being multiplied by a really big number, as in when you get all the way to 200! and then have to multply that by 201 and 202...
Instead you will have the big numbers multiplied by smaller numbers, which will might improve the speed. Again, maybe im just being silly.

So my suggestion is to rewrite the hp version to use recursion, then compare speeds.


-Samuel

OKies, I will update the page over the next day or so. I would still like recursive and iterative timings for both calculators though.

Recursive timings for the HP are a little faster then the TI versions. I have a hunch that iterative programs will be much faster on the HP then the TI, but please try and prove me wrong! I'd really like an iterative TI basic program.

I could write it myself, but its only fair to let someone more experienced in TI basic produce an optimized version.

I was dehydrated yesterday from something we did in gym class. It doesn't surprise me at all that I wrote that.

The site was a bit biased, but the author said that he liked the HP more, and he knew more about it. The HP49G+ really only has speed and memory over the TI-89. I think, as far as math goes, the TI-89 is better.

The site seemed to be a bit biased*** But in reality, it wasn't. The author only stated facts, not opinions. The reason that the G+ is coming out as sounding much better than the TI-89 is because he has more experience with it, and so he naturally knows more good features about the HP49G+ than the TI-89.

I used an 89 for a long time and I tryied a 49g without much success but right now I'm using a 49g+ and as far as math goes and most particularly as far as the CAS goes it spanks the ti89. The HP has a CAS that is more powerful and it's got a lot more built-in functions than the Ti

In aproximate mode, the TI-89 took 17 minutes to calculate randMat(32,32)^-1
The HP-49g+ took 55 seconds to do the equivalent.

thats sad... the very first post is inappropriate... the ti community is degrading in quality...

i didnt see it, but i assume it was some volley of rude insults directed at HP...

No, it was actually most likely deleted due to a post about the position of the post (i.e. in what order the comment came)

Bah...don't these people who come up with these insults realize that if there were no HP calcs, there would be no competition for TI, higher prices, and not as much incentive for Texas Instruments to continually strive to improve their calcs?

I'm not sure the presence of HP gives TI much incentive to improve their calculators. TI has a much, much bigger market.

I can't remember what it said, but if it were really rude, I would probably remember. But as I mentioned before, I wasn't fully mentally there, yesterday. I don't think it had "first comment" either.

Although I am new here, I have been an HP user since my very early days of 8 years old. RPN has become my good friend; I haven't used algebraic mode consistently for several years. I believe that HPs and TIs have the same basic functions (has math changed much in the past 10 years?), but are different in operation. HPs were designed for engineers, etc., while TIs were designed for the students.

I'm probably going to get flamed like heck for saying all of this and I don't know why a devoted HP user like me expects to be in this site, except a punching bag. Although, I do use TIs sometimes.