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Comment by 4gotunameagain | Hacker News Reader

> The company established partnerships with big textbook companies that integrated TI-specific exercises (complete with screenshots of buttons) into classroom curricula. It sought approval for standardized test use from administrators like the College Board. And every time a competing tech innovation came along, it lobbied to maintain its perch atop the parabola.

Absolutely disgusting

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And absolutely killed the absolute best engineering calculator to ever exist--the HP48SX.

I still use all my HP calculators from the 80's and early 90's.

It's all about the keyboard. I can enter enormous streams of numbers and operators and never miss.

I worked for the HP calculator back in the early 90s. It was the first generation HP calculator that is looking to using new keyboard technology. The amount engineering effort to keep the tactile feedback was significant. It had to be just the right amount of click as well as the amount of pressure needed to make the contact.

The tactile feedback on the HP calculators is one of the those things that defined that product.

If you don't mind my asking: what was the "old" generation technology?

It seems like with modern manufacturing we ought to be able to replicate that.

To be honest, it has been too long ago for me to remember the details Sorry. From what I can recall, The "old" technology needed to be updated as the manufacturing methods were too costly.

> The "old" technology needed to be updated as the manufacturing methods were too costly.

Sure, costly for a volume manufacturer. However, for low volume, boutique manufacturing, you can tolerate a whole lot of "non-optimal" methods that may actually be easier to manufacture even if not cheaper.

I don't think that HP would see themselves as boutique manufacturer of calculators. :-)

I mean for a hacker/maker to clone. HP is clearly not going to bring back an HP 48SX.

RPN FTW.

I am shocked, shocked to find that monopolies are colluding to support each other.

I think that instead of disgust we should react with lawsuits and prison terms.

Maybe you should change lobbying regulation..

And join your local school board, at-least take an interest.

Throwing CEOs in prison won't deter the next guy.

> Throwing CEOs in prison won't deter the next guy.

We can at least try it a few times and see if it does.

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