[nabs-l] A Vent about the TI-36X Talking Scientific Calculator

[Jen]

i Guys,

Tomorrow will be the second time I have had someone from the Board of 
Education and Services for the Blind come to my house to troubleshoot 
problems with the TI-36X Talking Scientific Calculator. The reasons are 
twofold:

1. We had to calculate combinations and permutations in Statistics. 
Everyone else's calculator could do, say, "2 c 4 plus 8 c 3." If I tried 
this with mine, it calculated zero automatically.

It turns out I have to add the numbers, then press "combinations" or 
"permutations," then write the answer to each problem, then plug the 
separate answers into the original problem. Get this, the manual for 
this calculator didn't tell me how to do the combinations and 
permutations, it said pressing the keystrokes for these operations would 
do the trick. Neither the trainer nor I knew this beforehand...we had to 
figure it out ourselves.

2. In class Monday, we had to calculate exponents. My calculator gave 
the wrong answer, but my BrailleNote gave the right one...

In short, the interface is not intuitive. My counselor at Board of 
Education, Services for the Blind, said it was a new calculator, but my 
professor, who tried and failed to get it to work, said the technology 
was very old...

I wish the folks at Orbit Research, the company which makes the 
calculator, would improve their manuals...

You may reply if you wish, but they are not necessary...I just wanted to 
get this off my chest.