Two Calculators That Add Up

With all the sound and fury at CES this year, a pair of innovative calculators from HP slipped by me. While the SmartCalc 300s is aimed at the complex math that’s taught in high-school math and science classes, the SmatCalc 100 is for more basic math. The good news is that they are both budget priced.

To start, the SmartCalc 300s is a full-fledged scientific calculator that will fit into any high-school science and math curriculum. It won’t graph function but it can handle fractions and has nearly 250 built in functions. Powered by a small solar cell, it won’t chew through batteries. The center of attention is the SmartCalc 300s’s large display that allows it to show full expressions as they appear in textbooks. The best part is that the calculator costs $15.

By contrast, the small and compact EasyCalc 100 is a bargain at $8 and a way to outfit an entire class with a basic calculator that doesn’t skimp on features. On top of adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing, it can remember one number. Like the 300s, it’s solar powered, but the EasyCalc 100 has a traditional 12-digit numeric display. The best part is that the device turns itself off after being ignored for a set amount of time.