Curta calculator | Hacker News Reader

Curta calculator

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23 pointsjacquesm17 comments

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Here's a demo video of a Curta calculator:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYsOi6L_Pw4

From the comments on that video:

> Are you guys serious when you say that it costs more than $1000 ???

> I just bought one at a flea market for 13 Cents!!!

Some people are just way too lucky.

I would not trust YouTube comments all that much. Buying a Curta for 13 cents would be the arbitrage opportunity of the decade. You could sell it on eBay for more than $1000 (there's no shortage of collectors looking for Curtas, myself included), which is more than 7500x the price you paid for it.

There is a follow up with the serial number and the buyer, I think I'll believe it.

My dad once bought a painting on a flea market that is now on display in a museum. Weirder stuff happens.

Wow. Someone got extremely lucky, then. I know people who would prowl flea markets and antique stores, and sometimes they would find some seriously under-valued assets. And the academics say that the markets are efficient...

They can still be efficient [1]: You have to factor in the time you have to spend at the flea market.

[1] For certain values of efficient.

My comment on efficient markets was facetious. Sure, one must consider the time spent at the flea market, but what numerical value does one assign to 1 hour of one's time? In the end, I find that the question "are markets efficient?" is not even well-posed, as one must provide a precise definition of efficient in order to avoid engaging in endless pseudo-philosophical discussion.

Yes, it's one of that questions that spawns a lot of interesting research, but it's to ill-defined on its own to have a good answer. One needs to add a good definition of `efficient' to make the question (and answers) meaningful.

Simulator:

http://www.vcalc.net/curta_simulator_en.htm

It's amazing it's so small. I have a couple of FACIT calculators, it seems that the functionality is pretty much the same to the Curta, but the curta is so much smaller.

It's amazing it's possible to do all 4 basic arithmetic operations on these devices.

have you seen the poster? http://www.vcalc.net/images2/Master21G-860x560.jpg from http://www.vcalc.net/cu.htm

> Curta calculators contributed to the saying when describing the process of calculating, "Cranking out the answer."[citation needed]

We bought one of these last year, for my Dad's 70th birthday (he's a math geek). They are very special little devices.

Wow. That must have cost you a pretty penny.

I've been wondering if anybody in my surroundings has one, I'd love to play with one for a bit.

Amazing little device, check out the exploded views linked at the bottom of the page.

Here is another nice picture:

http://home.comcast.net/~timewise1/curta/curta.html

and another link:

http://www.vcalc.net/cu.htm

disassembly:

http://www.vcalc.net/disassy/

There are a few of us to share the cost, fortunately. An expensive gift, but it gives pleasure to everyone who picks it up, and will do so for a long time.

What a wonderful thing to do.

This is the kind of machine that I think the patent system was intended for, what a genius design.

Better not use one in public: people will think that you're trying to detonate a handgrenade!

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