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Comment by luma | Hacker News Reader

I really wish I could get a dedicated handheld graphing calculator that hasn't had most of the functionality removed due to standardized testing. We live in an age of miracles but having a decent solver on a dedicated device is apparently commercially impossible because it couldn't be sold to students.

I'm just a dude in my shop that occasionally would like to integrate a thing or two without getting coolant on my phone.

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There is DM42 hardware[1] and the DB48X/C47 firmwares for it. I feel that they are very much pushing the boundary on what makes sense on a formfactor like that.

For something more powerful, you'd probably want something more in the "cyberdeck" direction, with some 3d printing and cheap ARM linux boards it's relatively easy to build portable distraction-free compute device.

I adore this Micro Journal device[2]. Although it's intended for writing, it's not too difficult to imagine it running some suitable calculator software. The keyboard could be easily adapted to HP Voyager (15c etc) style layout.

[1] https://www.swissmicros.com/product/model-dm42n

[2] https://liliputing.com/micro-journal-rev-2-revamp-is-a-compa...

HP Prime G2 can certainly graph things, evaluate integrals, solve systems of equations etc not sure how hard you’re looking because all the manufacturers have models like that. They have an exam mode which nerfs the calculator for tests.

TI has CAS enabled variants of their calculators.

The TI-Nspire CX CAS II, Casio ClassPad fx-CP400, and HP Prime G2 are the main CAS-enabled calculators available these days. The TI-89 Titanium and HP-50G are also options, albeit older models (with the HP-50G being discontinued).

If you'd rather get coolant on a dedicated device, there are some insanely good mobile calculator apps—and desmos' site or mobile app. You can install them on a virtually limitless range of devices.

Have you looked at some of the alternative firmwares for older Numworks models?

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