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Received this email from HP, the question is whether it's honest or diplomatically worded bulls%$#@ ?

Dear Valued Customer
>
> We received your mail over the past few days. First of all , let me
> extend a warm "thank you" for your very loyal and unwavering support for
> HP calculators and in particular, our RPN technology.
> Secondly, it is very important that we reassure you that HP will continue
> to offer a full line of both RPN and Algebraic calculators. We have
> currently, under development, an enhanced, new range of financial,
> scientific and graphing calculators to replace the following: HP17BII,
> HP32SII, HP19BII, HP38G, HP39G, HP40G, HP48G, HP48GX and the HP49G. Many
> of you have expressed a strong preference for some of the above products
> and it is important that you receive this reassurance. Please note,
> however, that some of these products have been discontinued but will be
> replaced over the next 6 -12 months, a few as soon as this summer and
> fall. You should be also made aware that you might encounter difficulty
> with buying products being replaced, depending on your geographic region.
>
> Our best selling financial calculators HP12C and HP10BII will continue as
> important parts of our product offering, together with our HP30S
> scientific model. More recently, we introduced two entry level algebraic
> products --the 9s scientific and 9g graphing calculators.
> We are putting your names and e-mail addresses on file and will keep you
> on our customer mailing lists. As and and when we make announcements
> regarding our new product launches and retail availability, we will keep
> you informed. In the meantime, I welcome you to write to me directly if
> you have any questions at all.
> Thank you.
>
> Kind Regards
>
>
> <<...OLE_Obj...>>
>
>
> Lee-Khuan Goh
> Worldwide Marketing Manager (Calculators)
> Personal Systems Group
> Hewlett Packard Company
> Tel: 858 655 3903
> External E-mail: lee-khuan_goh@hp.com

Dear Valued Customers,

First of all, let me extend a warm "thank you" for your very
loyal and
unwavering support for HP calculators and in particular, our RPN
technology.

Secondly, it is very important that we reassure you that HP will
continue to offer a full line of both RPN and Algebraic
calculators. We
have currently, under development, an enhanced, new range of
financial,
scientific and graphing calculators to replace the following:
HP17BII,
HP32SII, HP19BII, HP38G, HP39G, HP40G, HP48G, HP48GX and the
HP49G. Many
of you have expressed a strong preference for some of the above
products
and it is important that you receive this reassurance. Please
note,
however, that some of these products have been discontinued but
will be
replaced over the next 6 -12 months, a few as soon as this
summer and
fall. You should be also made aware that you might encounter
difficulty
with buying products being replaced, depending on your
geographic
region.

Our best selling financial calculators HP12C and HP10BII will
continue
as important parts of our product offering, together with our
HP30S
scientific model. More recently, we introduced two entry level
algebraic
products --the 9s scientific and 9g graphing calculators.

No other company has ever made RPN calculators.

It is important to us that we answer your question. If you need
further assistance, please reply to this message, we will be
happy to
help you.

Sincerely,
Kellie
HP Consumer e-Support

--I particularly love the last statement. I own a Sinclair, a Commodore, and several Russian Elektronika calculators, all RPN.

Tony David Potter

"No other company has ever made RPN calculators."
-- Kellie of HP support..

>>> I particularly love the last statement. I own a
>>> Sinclair, a Commodore, and several Russian
>>> Elektronika calculators, all RPN.

You betch. I believe Bowmar had one (?), I know Omron & APF had one too. (Didn't know about Commodore though). And of course National Semiconductor/Novus had a few RPN calcs with 3-level stacks, IIRC (Mathematcian, Scientist - though they had poor transcendatal func. accuracy). I think Nat'l/Novus even had an RPN sci. calc wristwatch in 1976-78 area before they got out of the biz; not sure how many made it into production.

Poor Kellie at HP - she must have an MBA to be that self-assured of her incompetence. Must have a direct link to Carly, and the people who thought it was good to sell off Agilent.


Bill Wiese
San Jose, CA

Wang calculators -- admittedly not pocketable items! -- also used RPN.

In fact, I believe the HP 9100 machine was HP's first big jump into the field of electronic calculators, which at the time was essentially owned by Wang Laboratories. It was intended to steal as much of Wang's business as possible.

See "Riding the Runaway Horse" by Charles Kenney (1992) and "Lessons" by An Wang (1986).

an RPN watch calc? any idea what model numbers are? I have to keep an eye out for one of those.

Hi..

>> an RPN watch calc? any idea what model
>> numbers are? I have to keep an eye out
>> for one of those.

No, I can't remember. Can't remember if it was marked Novus or a Nat'l Semiconductor either.

It was an *LED* (!) watch in a black plastic case/band setup much like the Casio calc watches of the early 1980s. Fairly thick: I think it took 4 x larger watch batteries.

IIRC, there would be an ad for this in Scientific American, perhaps in 1977. Memory is fading, could be off by a year either direction (though I *do* recall they had a computers/microelectronics issue in Sept 1977 that had a pull-out 3-page full-color ad for TI-58/59 - this could be the issue with this calc watch in it too!

Bill Wiese
San Jose, CA

Maybe I am wrong: this one was scientific but not RPN and had an LCD not LED, and was in metal case. See:

http://homepage.mac.com/utdesign/watch/watches/novus.html

I keep thinking they had an LED version in plastic though!!

Bill Wiese
San Jose,CA

Your comment about poor Kellie at HP-
I can't speak to her pedigree, but one thing is for sure. All of the "form letters" people have seen from HP calculator support personnel are in fact from out-sourced help. Yes, the ugly truth is that all HP calculator support is out-sourced and they are not direct HP employees, only Carly sock puppets.

Just try to get calculator support without going through the main support phone number. You can't do it. Since they no longer have a calculator division, why should they have a support group? Don't believe me? If you have caller ID, just call the origin phone number should they ever call you back about a problem. I will not name the company here, other than to say it is not HP. Surprised? I'm not!

Hi;

So, all answers related to a new RPN calculator are "endorsed" (if so) by HP but were not written by any HP employee!

What else, guys, what else...

It strikes me that if any new range of calculators is to be designed and manufactured by a third party, supported by a third party, and distributed by third parties, then the only thing HP is bringing to the party is financing - which the original manufacturer probably wouldn't need - and some pretty shabby marketing which consists primarily of the HP brand value.

What HP needs to realize is that their target market is *completely unimpressed* with "brand value". The readers of this forum, especially, see beyond that and are looking for high quality design, documentation and manufacturing. Those are the things that established the Hewlett-Packard reputation (i.e. brand) and it was the loss of those things that led to the brand's decline.

If a new, high-quality RPN calculator becomes available from both HP and from an otherwise-unknown Asian OEM, I for one will buy the OEM product. I prefer my dollars to go directly to the company and people who actually do good work.

Best,

--- Les [http://www.lesbell.com.au]

Why is this such an issue. If hp is using a form letter to respond to people who want quality, professional grade (and preferably RPN) calculators, it indicates that the company has received a lot of input about the subject and is responding to it. The fact that they've hired a consultant to draft the letter isn't out of the ordinary and isn't negative. Why should the support staff--at whatever its present level may be--spend a lot of time drafting individual replies for this type of thing when the form letter is adequate?

Hi;

for me, I see the issue more in the same concerns exposed by Les Bell in his post. Calculators were never a third party business at Hewlett-Packrd.

But the fact is that I am talking yesterday, when an specific division at HP used to deal with calculators, and there was enough demand for that.

You're talking today. You're right.

Cheers.