Re: Is it a bird? Is it a plane?

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Re: Is it a bird? Is it a plane?

>Umm...who cares about Flash ROM?  As a **user** and **programmer** of a
>graphing calculator, I'd rather have 1.5MB of RAM.

Okay, without disagreeing with this sentiment, I'll just point out
something.  When TI improved the 85 into the 86, they did add more RAM, but
because they didn't change much of the workings they had to do this "paging"
thing to get it to read the new RAM.  This made the 86 run slower (I never
noticed it, but others did).  Now, note that when TI went from the 83 to the
83+ they made a point of not changing anything except for the addition of
Flash ROM and Flash Apps, to make it so 83+ owners couldn't get confused in
classrooms where teachers have 83s and vice versa.  So these two factors
would combine to keep TI from wanting to increase the RAM.  Of course it
still leaves the 83+ Silver as pitiful a machine as the 83 and 82 before it
compared to the 86 and 89/92, but since the 83 series is TI's best selling
there isn't much room to argue.

Also note that the vast majority of TI graphing calculator users are
students who have absolutely no idea how to write a program, even a Basic
one.  I suspect that the power users who utilize every last ability the
calculator can dish out are but a small blip on TI's radar. Especially since
those power users generally buy something better than the 83+ to begin with.
So in the end it's a lot easier for TI to pile on more Flash ROM than it is
for them to restructure the RAM architechure to add more of that.  The
coward's way out?  Sure.  TI seems happy to walk that path as long as they
keep selling calcs.  Although it does make me wonder, why do they even
bother with this Silver Edition at all?

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