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The ancestors |
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Programmable calculators from the Texas Instruments and Hewlett-packard brands were so numerous that not all of them became " cults" and subject to copying or cloning.
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 At Texas Instruments three models released between 1977 and 1978 are remembered:
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The TI-57, with an affordable price for its time, was a good little programmable device that brought joy to many users.
It is the first to be manufactured ("duplicated"?) or marketed under other names or other brands (EC-4044 at Radio Shack< /B>, PTK-1050 at Híradástechnika)
The TI-57 will be followed by the TI-57 LCD in 1982 and then by the TI57 II in 1985.
This line will end with the TI-62 Galaxy in 1986.
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The
TI-58/58C and TI-59
had more memory than the TI-57 but above all used pre-programmed modules for mathematics, aviation, statistics... and the possibility of connecting to a printer.
The TI-59 also had a magnetic card reader allowing programs to be saved.
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The TI-59, will be followed by the TI-88 released only in a few prototypes and abandoned by Texas Instruments just before its commercial release.
This TI-88 would surely also have become a cult machine but it will remain a mythical, inaccessible object that many people dream of.
Then in 1983 the TI-66 descendant of the TI-59 and its printer did not have the success of their ancestor: no more modules or magnetic card reader.
In 1986 the TI-95 Procalc did not delight TI-59 fans any more despite the memory expansions and other peripherals.
The TI-59, despite a fragile keyboard prone to bounce and a card reader that does not withstand the years, therefore remains the cult machine in the Texas Instruments family .
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 At Hewlett-Packard between 1979 and 1983 calculators different in their functionalities and their presentation will leave their mark:
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The Voyager series with models
HP-10C,
HP-11C,
HP-12C,
HP-15C and
HP-16C
will offer a range of choices between scientific programmable calculator, financial programmable calculator and programmable calculator for computer programmers.
The "financial" HP-12C (released in 1981) will even be reissued 30 years later in the "30th Anniversary Edition" and will give new versions (clones?) called "Platinum"...
What other calculator will have had such a saga?
The "scientific" HP-15C (released in 1982) will also have reissues because in 2011 Hewlett-Packard markets the HP -15C LE (Limited Edition).
This limited edition was sold out in a few weeks and was produced following a petition that collected more than 15,000 signatures.
Then in 2023, a new reissue is marketed under the name HP-15C Collector's Edition. When will there be a “Collector Limited”?
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The HP-41
is without any doubt the most cult, the most mythical of programmable calculators.
First certainly because of its power (for the time) and its capabilities but also because of a fantastic innovation: an LCD screen and not a Red LED allowing text to be displayed !
...and overriding criterion: a large number of peripherals, extension modules and function modules covering all imaginable domains.
Certainly another calculator (TI-59) could boast of having a magnetic card reader, function modules, a printer but only the HP-41 had a barcode reader allowing you to load programs, not to forget the HP-IL loop...
More than 40 years later, the interest it arouses is tenacious given the number of websites devoted to it and the success of online sales of its models.
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TI-57...