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Comment by PeterStuer | Hacker News Reader

In my youth my treasure was a HP41cv. I always found RPN far more logical, conceptually cleaner and as a result far simpler to use.

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If you want a recreation:

https://www.swissmicros.com/product/dm41x

They also have their own versions of the 15c and so on. I have 3 different models (and one original HP RPN calc) and can confirm they are really high quality. Again though, spreadsheets are a lot more useful to me when I have more than just a simple calculation or two. I think these are mostly getting picked up by hobbyists, collectors, and those who work in labs and need a dedicated device with physical buttons.

Note that it doesn't have the big expansion pack things that I think the 41c came with if I'm thinking about the right calculator.

I've been really tempted as my 41CV doesn't work any longer but I do real calculating so little that it would just be a nostalgia trip. (And I have a couple of the horizontal format HP calcs that still work for any of the calculator stuff I do sometimes do outside of an app.)

Yeah, for me it's mainly a hobbyist thing without much value at this point (probably better uses for my money). I'd love to have something like the 15c with a much bigger screen that does APL with physical buttons. Now that would be cool. I effectively have that on a tablet though (minus the dedicated system with physical buttons).

That link made my day! Thank you. From what I read, their builds perform better than the originals, and they even make landscape versions. Woo hoo! RPN rules in my book. I picked up an HP 32 before they were gone forever, but I've been afraid to use it. It's great to know about SwissMicros; they'll get my business soon.

Not a problem.

I have their DM42 and it feels good in the hands. The case is solid metal too and the screen is nice. I believe the performance is better than the originals (not hard as some of these were sold before my birth and I'm not exactly a spring chicken anymore) and they fixed several bugs.

OK I always see this sentiment.

Can someone show something useful in RPN? House odds on 3 on roulette, or don't come odds for 10; or the standard deviation of 1, 1, 1, 1, 7, 29.

I have never seen anyone show an example more complex than 2 2 12 + * or whatever it looks like.

Plus, for owners of the HP41, if you had an essay question in your chemistry test you could type in cliff notes... Naw, I never did that.

I did do that! But data entry was so laborious that by the time you entered the formulas you basically knew them by hard.

A decent way to cram for an exam you don't care much about is to hand copy the course material too. You'll most likely end up retaining enough to pass.

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