Brand: | Texas Instruments |
Model: | TI-38 |
Type: | Scientific calculator |
Picture: | |
Batteries: | LR 44 x 2 |
Lifetime: |
Introduced: 1979 Terminated: unknown |
Notes: |
The TI-38 is an 8-digit scientific calculator.
The first thing one notices is how dark this calculator is. One needs quite a bit of light to see the markings above the keys. Quite a lot of pressure is needed to operate its keys. All in all not a great pleasure to use. When numbers with exponents are displayed, only five positions of the number are shown, the last three digits are used for spacing and the 2-digit exponent. The factorial operation x! does not have a check on the upper bounds of its input. The maximum factorial that can be calculated is 69! as usual for a calculator with a 2-digit exponent. However when one tries to calculate 70! which will overflow, it takes almost 6 seconds before the "Error" message is displayed. The larger the number the quicker the error is displayed, so it clearly uses a recursive countdown for factorials. It does error immediately on negative numbers though. The EE key can be used to multiply any result or even the constant π by a power of ten. So, when the display shows the value of π, press EE 2 to multiply it by 102. |
©2024 Ernst Mulder