Joel Kolstad wrote:
"Joerg" wrote in message
...

My HP-11C ran a whopping 15 years on the first set of battery. $6 later it
had a new set and that's on its fourth year now.


You'll be pleased to know that the guy who's sort of the defacto head design
engineer for HP calculators these days actually cares about power consumption
and gave a presentation demonstrating that things are getting better in the
sense of future calculators that are comparably featured to those vintage ones
(like the 11C) will use the same or less power than before. He had a story
about how he went and verbally kicked some overseas engineer's butt for
replacing a switching regulator with a linear and significantly shortening
battery life on a certain model; the guy said, "but a linear is cheaper!" to
which he replied, "Yes, but it's stupid!"

That's the kind of engineer I want designing calculators -- one who knows his
customers' priorities. :-)

(I know that if it were you, Joerg, the switcher would end up being cheaper as
well, of course. :-) )


Well, I'd have to see what they've go so far ;-)


Unfortunately details of this (specific models and features and hardware) are
under NDA.


Thanks for sharing this, Joel. So there is hope in case my old 11C
croaks. Actually it's my wife's.

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com