Commodore calculator
Posted by riotz1@reddit | vintagecomputing | View on Reddit | 15 comments
Display is more green than blue, though it looks very blue in the picture. I thought this was the one with the turquoise display but now that I think about it I have a small pocket size basic Commodore calculator that has the gorgeous bright blue display.
Kindly_Stop6208@reddit
I had one of these, if you pressed two keys at once you could enter weird characters and do arithmetic with them
GregP74@reddit
We gave my granddad one of those for Christmas probably around 1979. I had it down in my basement until a couple years ago!
On a completely unrelated note, I've been looking for ideas for retro colors on keycaps for a new keyboard. That's kind of got me thinking...
AwkwardSpread@reddit
They missed a few R’s in there
sprashoo@reddit
Oof. That’s sloppy.
general0ne@reddit
They must have been typing on a chicklet keyboard 😂
riotz1@reddit (OP)
😂 I never noticed that until you said that and it jumped right out at me
EdiblePeasant@reddit
It looks pretty cool, thanks for sharing. I didn't know Commodore made calculators. From the look of it it's not as feature-laden as some scientific calculators and others. But Commodore seemed to really know quality design, or maybe that's just me falling for the marketing and nostalgia hype.
norty-dc@reddit
Most A level math students in the late 70's would have given their eye teeth for this model, and it was quite well specced, and priced.
The ones we had were the LED , not VFD
luckierbridgeandrail@reddit
I had a Commodore P50 in high school because I couldn't afford an HP or even a TI.
TheLimeyCanuck@reddit
I have one that looks almost identical but it has a red LED magnifier display instead of VFD and mine is programmable. That feature was never very useful because you couldn't save your programs.
IowaNobody@reddit
For some reason I read that as "Commode Calculator" and was really confused for a second
FeistyDay5172@reddit
As a kid, I had almost identical one. The keyboards the same, but mine was a red LED display. My first calculator ever. Damn, thank you for bringing back a valuable memory for me! 👍😎
This-Requirement6918@reddit
Mmm VFDs are definitely my favorite kind of display. I have a Texas Instruments from the same era sitting on my desk I use any chance I get.
riotz1@reddit (OP)
https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/30279/Commodore-SR-1800-Calculator/
According to this, it’s as old as I am, dating from 1976. Older than I thought, I’d figured it was very early 80s
AmoreLucky@reddit
It's funny, you look at the original chiclet keyboard the PET initially came with and you can see right there Commodore's calculator roots and how they expanded from there