Unreasonable price for a HP-35?
#1

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3011035388

Isn't that just HP-35 version 3 in nice condition? Is there something special about that one?

#2

I think the reason it is getting such high bids is that the unit looks brand new. I very rarely see them in this good a condition.

#3

Well, if anything, I might consider that starting price to be
"unreasonably low". I'd have to assume that the bidders consider
whatever they actually bid to be reasonable. I sometimes think that some
bidders may have more money than common sense, but hey, it's their
money; who are we to say that they shouldn't spend it as they please?

Regards,
James

#4

How about these completed Ebay auctions I stumbled on yesterday:

A pair of 1 meter RCA cables made with silver wire for $99, http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=14965&item=3008209821

10 ft of 24 gage silver wire for $16 to use for wiring inside audio equipment - seller recommends letting it "break in" for 100 hours to hear the improvement in the sound quality, http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=14965&item=3006912524

25 ft of 96% tin/4% silver rosin core solder .032 in diameter for $14, I need to figure out how this compares to normal prices which are stated per pound or per ounce, http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=14965&item=3008213768

A duplex AC wall outlet that has been cryogenically treated - cooled to below -315 F - which somehow allows it to contribute to the sound quality of your stereo system for $39, http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3284&item=3002648461

Same again for $46, http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3284&item=3006913469

A set of turntable tonearm wires - 4 wires 2 ft. long terminated at one end - made of silver, need 150 hours to "break in", for $71, http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3284&item=1943237279

This guy has about 280 positive feedbacks and his specialty is this silver wire and 96/4 (tin/silver) solder, which I have learned recently has become fairly common, you can get it at Radio Shack or Home Depot, it's one of the new lead free alloys being popularized for common use. I give the seller credit that he provides some of the solder and teflon tubing with the silver wire "at no extra charge" and plus, I don't blame any seller of luxury items for the prices his customers are willing to pay. What gets me is the extravagant claims made for the power of silver wire to improve the "depth and breadth" of music by using it to connect low level signals. And how much impact can the AC wall outlet have on the quality of the sound coming out of the speakers? $39 worth? $46 worth? You know, wire wrap wire is silver plated. How many people would be able to tell silver plated copper wire from solid silver wire?

I was looking for information on soldering stainless steel and I came upon the Indium Corporation of America which makes many products from Indium including specialty solders, many without Indium. Now, for pure Indium wire (which has the amazing property that if it is cleaned properly it can be used to solder things together without any heat at all) they charge $180 for a minimum quantity of 3 feet of solid wire .03 inch in diameter. Well, maybe that's what Indium goes for - and this Indium is very pure - but they also sell 63/37 (tin/lead) solder, the "eutectic" alloy of tin and lead (a word whose definition I finally learned today, basically means it melts and solidifies at the same temperature) and a very commonly used alloy for electronic soldering, either it or 60/40 has been used for just about all electronic soldering for ages, it costs about $10 per pound - for the same 3 feet by .03 inch dia., the Indium Corporation charges $150!!! For a 1 pound bar - no, I misspeak, it's a 500 gram bar - they want $250. This might be very pure 63/37 solder, but they are selling it for use in a pot or a wave solder machine. I can only imagine that those prices are for unqualified customers. Or that there are some extremely critical applications that require whatever its properties are. While I didn't find what I was looking for (a formula for stainless steel flux), I did learn a lot about solder!

#5

Ellis:

All I can comment is, "there's a sucker born every minute." Advertise special car paint (irradiated with cosmic or gamma rays), and some idiot will buy it believing your claim that the car will draw energy from sunlight and won't require gas anymore.

I guess that sick gullibility explains why the National Enquirer sells so much.

-EM (Feeling cynical today)

#6

These are the same folks who buy "Monster Cables" for their speakers. I use the cheapest 18 gauge power cord I can find (at pennies per foot), and it sounds just as good. Just use Ohm's law to compare any loss, and then turn up the volume 0.05 dB! (I'm pretty fussy about my music - no MP3s, and I get really turned off at the HVAC noise in the typical concert hall where you've paid $50 to listen to the orchestra.)

Can you imagine the sound if you both freeze your AC socket and expose the rest of the wires to X-rays!

#7

Anybody want to buy my Cryogenically treated, pure "Gold" content, irradiated, chemically treated, masterfully broken-in, strategically scratched (for better performance) 12C?

First $200 takes this one-of-a-kind, one-and-only unit!

Batteries not included.

Spicey

#8

I have a friend with a genuine, actually crogenically treated HP25... he was holding it in his hand while removing the top from a big liquid nitrogen dewar... you can guess the rest. I think a couple of the electrolytic capacitors were destroyed along with the batteries.

#9

He should sell it on ebay. He'll make a fortune <G>.

Spicey

#10

Back in 10th grade, I was the only kid in the (huge) high school with a Hewlett-Packard (11c) and it certainly did attract more attention than most calculators.

Well, I had one of my classmates absolutely convinced that the calculator had a microphone built into the little HP emblem. I said that it "digitalized" the sounds and stored them in binary code etc etc.

The convincing part was that I could set the calculator on an unterminated program loop and the display would flash
"running"......

I think my ploy finally dissolved when I was unable to "do" anything with the "digitalized" sounds!

#11

Speaking of stupid pet calculator tricks:

Have you ever held your HP-25 (or others, but only had that in high school) up to an AM radio while calculating?

You can even write programs that make wonderful computer-sounding sound effects!

Give it a try!

Michael

#12

Reminds me that the first program I got running on my 8080-based S-100 system back in 1977 or so was from an article by Steve Dompier in "Dr. Dobbs Journal of Tiny BASIC Computer Calisthenics and Orthodontia, or Running Light Without Over-Byte". The article, entitled "Music of a Sort", contained an octal listing of the program, plus two sets of data. By running the program and holding an AM radio nearby, one could hear the interference play "The Fool on the Hill", by The Beatles.

The second set of data was the music for - of course! - "Daisy, Daisy". All computers should be able to sing that!

Best,

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

#13

One of my favorite programs for the HP-71B combines NOISE.LEX and a basic program that allows keying in music.

Nothing's better than Bach, in two-part harmony, on a pair of HP-71's!!

The William Tell Overture is killer also.

Michael

#14

Well, the PDP-8 have this program that uses this
"feature" to generate music in four part harmonies
on the AM-band.

Quite impressive to hear Beethoven's fifth symphony
that way.

The program is also rather nice since it actually
takes a text file as input, containing the music
score, and generates the noise from that.

So anyone can write more music quite easily.



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