Sunday, August 7, 2022

Retro Review: Retro Review Radio Shack EC-480

Retro Review:   Retro Review Radio Shack EC-480








Quick Facts


Model:  EC-480

Company:  Radio Shack

Years:  1976-1977

Type:  Scientific 

Batteries: 2 x AA, separate AC power 

Operating Modes:  Chain

Number of Registers: 1

Display:  8 digits, 1 left character for shift and error indicator


The EC-480 comes to have a brown, thin faux-leather cover.  


Pocket Sized Scientific Calculator


The EC-480 is a no-frills, lightweight, scientific calculator: just the basics.   Most likely, this would be an on today's smartphones.  The keys are plastic and thankfully the keys are responsive.   You can hear a click when the keys are pressed.  


Every of the 20 keys has a shifted function.  A smart move is the put the ON-OFF switch instead of making it a key.  


The keyboard:


C/CE; 1/X

F; cf  (Shift; Clear Shift)

EEX; conv

÷; arc  (for arcsin, arccos, arctan)

7; sin

8; cos

9; tan

×; sto 

4; e^x

5; 10^x

6; y^x

-; rcl

1; ln

2; log

3; √

+; m+

+/-; x^2

0; π

.;  (

=; )


The angle measurement used is degrees.


The conv function toggles the screen.  When a number is big or small enough to show a exponent, the conv functions shows the mantissa.  For example:


5.5.638 E 11 

× 1.2365 E 10 

= 6.8796 E 21

(conv) 6.8796387   (6.8796387 * 10^21)

(conv) 6.8796 E 21


The one thing I do not like about the EC-480 is that sometimes the 10^x function is sometimes inaccurate due to rounding error.  For example:


10^3 returns 1000

10^4 returns 10000

10^5 returns 99999.999

10^6 returns 999999.99

10^7 returns 10000000


Try 2^x * 5^x instead.  (Possible keystrokes:  2 y^x x = sto 5 y^x x * rcl =)


No Order of Operations


The EC-480 does not follow the order of operations, instead of the chain operating system.  This may be a turn off for some people.  Just to illustrate this:


4 + 5 × 6 returns 54

4 + ( 5 × 6 ) returns 34

5 × 6 + 4 returns 34


Green Display


The display has 9 characters.  The right 8 contain numbers, with the left as an indicator.   


#.#.#.#.#.#.#.#.#.


The first decimal point indicator appears when you press the blue shift key.  


The left character is a negative sign with nothing else is when the calculator is sleeping.  I like this feature to save battery.  


Source


Flow Simulation Ltd.  "Radio Shack EC-480"  calculator.org 2022.  https://www.calculator.org/calculators/Radio_Shack_EC-480.html   Retrieved June 5, 2022


Eddie


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