Which TI calc is the most useful for undergrads?

[emeraldgirl08]

I need one that is versatile and will take me through the rest of my undergrad college courses. I've posted a WTB ad on Market but am also looking through fleabay as sometimes a good deal will poke it's head out

Any suggestions???

TIA.

[mattbiernat]

depends to which college you go to. at UCI (unviersity of california Irvine) all calculators that were capable of storing memory were banned. so it was to you advantage to practice doing homework without using such calculator.

[qviri]

Wouldn't it really, really depend on the undergrad? I've had courses where graphing calculators were allowed in exams and others where anything programmable was verboten. If you're in business, different functionality will be useful than in pure math, than in science...

[emeraldgirl08]

Well I need a calc anyway.

I did find one through another forum and paid $15 for it. It's a TI-85 and I've read that it's discontinued but I figure if it can do the basic necessities and is hackable then it's no problem.

[mattbiernat]

i believe in my school programmable calculators were banned for all majors. besides if you are a non sicence major i don't think you need one!

[beeblebrox]

If in engineering, a simple Casio, TI or maybe the new HP is sufficient.
I used a Casio FX-5000f, which could have 10 little programs written by yourself. It was more than enough.
In exams, programmable calculators were forbidden anyway, and during the semester you use your PC, netbook anyway. No need to buy an expensive calculator.

In business I have been using my old trusted HP 17Bii, which is just sufficient for basic stuff. Unfortunately, HP stopped innovating a decade ago and their calculators, even their newest are totally not state-of-the-art.

My recommendation: iPhone or iPod Touch. You get the most perfect calculators as apps. Even the HP Business calculators are available as apps! For $3.95 instead of $89 from HP.

Go for Apple

[neenee]

For $3.95 instead of $89 from HP.

However, the iPhone/Ipod Touch, does cost something. In the long run, you'd pay more than $89

That said, if the OP has a smartphone/PDA, a software application is a good recommendation

[emeraldgirl08]

Hi neenee. I do have a PDA and there are uh...certain em...um apps that will work for me

However in the long-run a dedicated graphing calculator is needed. If for some reason I was unable to use my Axim then at least I'd have the calculator handy. I also found that using a calculator made me think of a new approach to solving some of the problems which is a good thing. Helps me remember and think of the formulas in a bigger picture

As for everyone chiming in on taking one into an exam I don't see myself doing something like that. As far back as I can remember calculators were a no-no in exams. Pretty much common sense kind of thing for me.

So as I mentioned someone sold me a Texas Instruments ti85 in another forum. I also found two apps on linux called Lybniz Graph Plotter and Speedcrunch that seem to work fine for now as well.

[sparta.rising]

I used a Ti-89 through Aerospace Engineering. Was useful linear algebra that is not as easily accomplished with a Ti-83. However, I usually just used MatLAB when I had access to a computer, so basically any time except for exams.

[NorrisCell]

It depends on the courses as well. When I chose to go back to school, I still had my TI-86, which was cutting edge for its' time. Now everyone had a TI-83/84 which had different keystrokes for a lot of calculus functions. I ended up springing for a TI-84 because I didn't want to add the difficulty of translating calculator operations from a different model to the difficulty of calculus already.