There are medical defibrillators: the modern ones have capacitors that don't make that high pitch, so some manufacturers have had to add sound chips, just because it's expected to make that noise to 'prove' that it's working.
It's not actually the capacitor bank that makes the whining, it's the HV charge circuit. Modern ones still whine, it's just above the range of human hearing.
Just like many modern cars has a speaker making the sound for the turn indicator, where in older cars it's the actual indicator relay that makes the click-clack.
Those are called skeuomorphs (mentioned in this video: ua-cam.com/video/xn7ZaT3AgoU/v-deo.html), they're the inclusion of features from old things in their successors. Such as the camera-shutter sound when taking a picture with a smartphone, the icon for calling being an old landline phone or the icon for email being an envelope. All skeuomorphs, purely to make the new things more familiar to people used to the older versions of these things.
“Why not just buy a new one?” *”Well, I like this one.”* I can’t agree more with this attitude. Making everything disposable has broken any concept of sentimental value of things to so many people.
I was asked the same thing when I had to borrow a screwdriver to open up my old TI-83, which had stopped powering on even with a fresh battery. Sure I can do most of my calculations on my computer/phone and I probably could find a used replacement for not that much but I like *my* calculator and frankly sometimes the inputs with real buttons are nicer than digital stuff. Turned out the only problem was that the metal arms connecting the battery to the board are just sort of pushed against some contacts and at some point a drop must have bent them just enough that they weren’t quite touching anymore. Used pliers and had it working perfectly again
01:02 - Most likely, the same case is also used for an actual solar-powered calculator. It's cheaper to just cover up the solar panel in the non solar-powered models than to make individual cases for each. You can also see that there are recesses for two button batteries, even though the specific model uses a single battery that is mounted directly to the circuit board. One case molding, different calculator models.
Exactly. Those calculators are as cheap as they are because the entire process -from market research to design to production to distribution- was done so as efficiently as possible. Money was saved every step of the way, and manufacturing is usually the most expensive part.
I think you read too much into this. The manufacturer just stole the design from others and made minimal changes to it. By the way, the silver calculators are precisely the ones with fake solar cells, so just don't buy silver ones.
You do know that "solar light" is basically the same os normal light, irhgt? Just with more frequencies in it's spectrum. If you have a solar cell that works with visibile light, you don't need to point it at the sun for it to work, a light bulb will do.
When i was at Middle School, my mom gave me a Casio calculator that she used at high school. The device included a flip cover and had two way power. The only thing is that it had a dead battery, so I had to sit near the windows everytime I had a math exam. Similarly, I had a time limit to accomplish my math homework before nightfall or else my calculator wouldn’t turn on until the sun arises again. Fortunately, years later I found a way to replace the dead battery and it was a nice feeling to be finally using my calculator at night for the first time.
Hey, I think I have that same one! I know it's Casio. Is it the kind where you need to hold the flip cover open or it returns closed under spring tension?
@@slashplane Teaching kids how to use scientific calculators while they don't even know how to change the battery. Perfectly describes our education system.
I don't understand how I catch myself watching 18 minute long videos from start to finish about how some calculators have fake solar cells. I have work in the morning. The fuck am I doing with my life
I still use my gas powered calculator. Just changed the oil on it last night. I've noticed every time I'm studying, my CO detectors go off, and I mysteriously fall asleep while running the calculator. I seem to wake up when the auto-off feature activates. Odd
I found 4 identical broken 'solar' calculators that had real panels, but the panels weren't wired at all. Made a small compound cell out of them, and it just barely powers a 'lucky cat' that used to be battery powered 😃
I actually have seen this trend on cheap solar electrónics, i guess it's because solar controller chips and recargable batteries Increase the cost of the product so they only put the solar panel to look good. I buyed a cheap small solar lamp and worked well for a year, the next year the lamp light become weaker even when i put the lamp for hours on the Sun, so i disesamble the lamp and found out that even when the solar panel was real it wasn't connected to the circuit.
this is absolutely hilarious because i had that exact same model of calculator, knocked it off the desk, and realized the solar panel was fake too. amazing how something so specific happens to two completely different people by sheer chance. and yes i also liked how the buttons feel
I remember my first digital calculator. In the 1970s Radio Shack offered a four function LED calculator for $99 plus tax. I thought it was worth every penny. $100 in 1975 was equivalent to $485 today. Dollar Tree sell scientific calculators now for $1.00
A good Texas Instruments graphing/advanced calculator can still go for a few hundred. Still overpriced in my opinion, but it’s mostly due to the proprietary hardware TI uses. They’re designed in such a way that all of the computations are performed by the chip architecture rather than logic patterns on a processor. Makes them super-duper-quick and efficient at mathematical calculations.
You have to admit it’s pretty amazing that all the design work, engineering, making expensive moulds, buying in the calculating chips and batteries, raw materials, manufacturing, assembly, packaging then international shipping, distribution more freight, then unboxing and loading onto shelves… and you can buy it for a dollar or two. Then we wonder why so much goes to landfill. It’s just crazy.
the labor is subsidized by the government, the elected officials get elected by selling the idea of more jobs in their region to the voters, the voters commonly work jobs that are demanding enough but also simple enough to make them lower class at least for some period of time, the myriad volumes of cheap products constantly thrown away when the common folk suffer for long enough to earn something that is slightly less trash than the cheap products and the resulting cynicism, illness, and death from their earlier years removes a considerable amount of them from their identity as a voter and the cycle continues. its grim, i know. all the content out there on the internet doesnt actually help. the algorithms that direct you towards fun educational content also balance that out by cramming nonsense into your feeds. there is a phenomenon in competitive online videogames called skill based matchmaking or SBMM that is algoritmically pairing people with teammates that cause them to win as close to 50% of the time as possible for various reasons and the algorithms on sites like UA-cam work the same way. you and i and everyone else are all expendable, variables in an equation which serves the singular purpose of the sum of all things reaching zero (0). again, i apologize if it is grim, on an individual level it transforms from good thing to bad thing in a fluid sort of way but in a general sense it is actually kind of ruining the entire planet.
actually makes sense, since they probably have plastic molds and no sticker production system, just using available plastic pellets would be cheaper than ordering stickers from someone else and having someone man that part.
Imagine a guy holding up a bank with nothing but a calculator in his hand, and he asks the person behind the counter for "all the calculators in the drawer and no one gets subtracted."
I dont know how it works where you guys live but here when you get a office you can do what you want with all the stuff the person before didnt bother to remove
One reason (that I can think of) for fake solar cells is that the original injection mold has a space for solar cells, but the factory no longer makes solar cells and uses batteries exclusively. Given that a new injection mold can cost upwards of $250,000 USD, it's better to just put in a fake solar cell than to build a new injection mold.
I had a real solar calculator for a long time. I always loved playing with the solar panel by covering it up and making it slowly fade out and power off then give it light again so it popped back on.
in the 80s my friends walkman stopped working. we took it apart. they had bass boast buttons. it was a noise clicker. it didn't do anything, just clicked real loud
BADD1ONE Usually the bass boost button just mutes the bass tones when it's not pushed in, so that if you dont turn it on the music sounds worse. Tricks people into thinking the bass boost is a good thing.
The diode at 13:20 is a backflow blocking diode. It is to prevent the solar cell from trying to change a non-rechargeable battery. There must have been a mistake in the PCB because they are most often part of the PCB. This was a fix so they could use the PCBs for this unit. Either that or the PCB was also used in a battery only unit but by adding the diode they could use it in this unit.
It's installed the other way. It's there to keep the battery from discharging into the solar cell. The solar cell isn't going to produce enough energy to do any harm to that button cell, but the solar cell does present a load to the battery when it's not producing, and they just wired them in parallel, probably because the chipblob board they used didn't have an isolated input for the solar cell. :/
@@SwervingLemoni think this is a more plasuable explanation. Since solar cells acts almost like an LED and will drain the battery continuously if without a diode
I never considered the possibility the "solar cells " were fake though i have wondered how they made them cheap enough to have them on such low cost calculators, so i am surprised they are faked but not exactly shocked.
Studio Papa I posted comment before I got to the part where he explained that, but I suppose JSD could still be upset seeing his beloved former calculator being "ruined".
I suddenly have a question about those slot-in-your-front-door mail boxes, and couldn't those doors be pulled out of their frames with a piece of pipe, a chain and a truck. And maybe I've just found the right person to check this out. Btw, I liked this video, too.
Your front door, mailbox or no, if made of wood, can be broken open by a couple of guys with $12 steel sledge hammers from Home Depot in about 20 seconds. Or using a drill with a keyhole bit and reciprocating saw in 2 minutes. Or can be opened without breaking with a $50 lock pick in maybe 6 minutes.
i remember when i was doing an algebra test in high school. my calculator stopped working so i asked my professor if i could get up and use it next to the window so that i could continue calculating stuff. he accepted, and the calculator did indeed keep working as long as the sun kept hitting the small panel on it. my professor however did not trust his students at all so he basically stood behind me, staring at me and making sure i was not trying to cheat on the test (there were some other students sitting nearby and i could have theoretically given their tests a peek- but i did not for obvious reasons) still odd that so many cheap calculators have dummy solar panels. mines actually worked, which is not uncommon, and helped me quite a bit. i loved that calculator... then i lost it. still have some odd memories associated to it, like the one i narrated just now.
ever seen a car with plastic covers over the cigarette lighters. because some models of car come with the cigarette lighters and others don't. it's the same situation here they use the same plastic mould. and the cheaper version doesn't come with the solar panel so they have to fill it with something and you get a piece of black plastic.
+Adrian Miska: I clicked on it because the thumbnail does not have big tits, bikini, and the text doesn't say "You won't believe what she did", "You won't believe what the cameraman saw", "the 10 greatest something something".
I do remember 6th grade math class, circa 2005, we had solar calculators. I could cover the panel and the calculator would dim out. They were pretty cheap as I recall
I remember having a Solar-only powered battery. It had like 1 millimeter of thickness and when I covered the panel with my finger during a calculation, it could do crazy things. (i.e. 3+3= 777777777...) EDIT: I meant calculator, not battery. 3 years passed and I only now noticed the error.
There is a reason: some (real) solar calculators are dual power (i.e. there is a battery in parallel to the solar panel, and the battery and solar panel have both a diode to prevent either one "recharging" the other). If you leave the calculator ON in a drawer where there is no sunlight, you'll drain the battery :)
I dont want my calculator ready to calculate all the time, but i could also imagine maybe for a real one, turning off the circuit could make it last longer
I had that telstar calculator as a kid. I dropped it, dislodged the "solar panel" and tried to fix it to great disappointment. It inspired a life long fascination with how things work, and all the secrets that hide in even the most mundane objects.
My mom had a calculator shaped after a credit card. ALMOST SAME THICKNESS. It was too thin to even have a battery, and could fit in any wallet. Lovely little calculator. Never seen any calculator like it after that.
You can FUCK WITH PEOPLE this way just replace the MRC button with the EQUALS button and when you do a calculation, you input whatever numbers you want and press M+ then, you can just show it to people and do their calculation and when you press =, it will not compute whatever you inputed, it will show the answer to the previous calculation I believe this was done in an episode of "The Real Hustle" where they set up a fake money exchange and they would do this to people where they would use a 10% smaller exchange transaction ratio than the real one, and when they showed it to people, "proving" it was 100% legit they managed to fool everyone into giving them less money for their exchange noice
I remember I had this calculator that was basically a clear thin piece of plastic and it had almost touch screen buttons and was powered completely on the solar panel. That thing was pretty cool
Candycorn 2014 Being more intelligent than you, he knew everyone would know what meant when he used the common and convenient term "solar cell" Effective speaking involves who the audience is. :)
I discovered a phony solar cell a few years ago when I replaced the batteries in a Office Depot branded calculator. And that was a $10 calculator. My dad used to put his calculators in the windowsill because he thought the solar cell would recharge the battery.
It's crazy to me companies can sell solar yard lights for a dollar and then act like it's too expensive to put a much smaller solar cell on a calculator that costs more.
what people still use sundials what is this 1985 hello McFly!!! tee hee! just kidding dude, chill out, no need to stop drop and roll, but anal sex is surprisingly nutritious my good lad ;)
I have a chocolate calculator. The solar cell actually works. I had it since middle school. But i remember the display would dim if you covered the panel. I also made it glitch out one time like that.
You're right, I AM shocked! I didn't know that this was a thing... Also, I caught the homage to at least 3 different YT channels (was expecting puppets after the bongo riff). If only you had revealed the "chooch factor" of the calculators and made a Duke Nukem reference... :-)
Something inside me died a little… I am actually tempted to get my solar desk-calculator from the late 90s and open it up. Let's hope this one was still the real deal. I remember having a little solar calculator and when you blocked the Solar panel the LCD actually got dim. So that one must have been real.
Kids these days don't even know they're born. Back in Korea^WNam^Wthe70's^Wthe day we used to hacksaw the tops offa 2n3055's and put them in bright sunlight to get 2uA into 1Meg load. But we were happy. And healthy too. And we couldn't even spell Shokley properly - we still can't - because we had no light to learn by. Those were the days.
My best guess is that the manufacturer also produces another model of calculator with a functioning solar cell that uses the exact same molds for the case. It's cheaper to just cover up the slot with a thin plastic film than to shut down the supply line to change out the molds for ones without the slot.
that's exactly what it is. and a lot of the time the version with the solar panel is no longer sold. sudden they don't even bother anymore. remember this technologies decades and decades old. so if you're buying it from Walmart for $1 how much is Walmart buying it for? 10 cents
Hopefully neither it nor the citation of this video will be removed. Many Wikipedia editors slavishly remove all UA-cam-based citations, considering it an unreliable source. I say it's absurd to blanket-reject all UA-cam citations, since there are cases like this one where a UA-cam video is the best (or in some cases only) reference for a fact. Plus, common sense can tell you whether a video was likely to have been faked, and thus should not be considered a reliable source.
+Nothing in Particular: Comments with URLs in them tend to get held to be moderated by the channel owner, but I believe notification emails still get sent at the time the comment is originally posted _(when_ they get sent -- I dunno if there's any logic to when they get sent and when they don't; I didn't receive an email when you replied, for instance, and just discovered your comment now), so that being said, here's the URL of the article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar-powered_calculator
DanHarkless - You have restored balance to what was once a poor excuse of a Wikipedia article. On behalf of the International Solar Calculator Society (ISCS), I thank you for your service.
i used to always take them apart and take the " solar panel " off cause after you removed some foam, wires and tint you got a very nice sharp glass rectangle that scratched almost everything, fun af
they work really good for parting out lines of flour on a cd case so you can sweat all the CoHoes at the party...u will be Mr. Popular quick after a stunt like that ....till they see its flour....
that's true too. Funny thing about those $1 calculators are that the button batteries cost more than they do... I haven't seen button batteries for $1 (at least were I live)
It'd be a very inefficient way of making any kind of worthwhile wattage or current, I expect... but it could certainly be a pretty interesting alternative to a traditional step-up transformer if you got, say, 100 of them and wired them all up in series. A 20x5 grid of PV strips wouldn't even be too large (well, after all, it's 400 of those little squares), but it would then put out 160 volts DC (at, thankfully, a low current, and without much in the way of stored energy behind) when that same light was shone at it. Or still a good few dozen in ambient lighting. Which could give you the ability to deliver mild, joke-shop grade static-esque shocks to random people using nothing but the power of available light and some very simple cabling. However I bet there's a supplier somewhere that will sell you a literal bucket of the miniature PV strips, enough to make an entire business suit out of, for not very much money at all. You don't need the rest of the calculators, just the PVs. A few thousand of those in series, and assuming it doesn't exceed some kind of breakdown voltage in the cells (as far as each is concerned after all, they've only got 1.6v across them, even if that IS the difference between 230v and 231.6v) and is properly insulated, you could start emitting solar-powered plasma-ball style mini lightning and glows as you turn any nearby light into multiple-kilovolt glows and sparks. I wonder even if it would be enough for the Emperor's sith-lightning effects from Return of the Jedi. It need not carry quite so much paralysing power, just... yknow... be lightning shot from the fingers with no obvious central power source. Hmm..
I wonder what JSD from work would say if he saw this video and found that his solar calculator vanished from the office just to be butchered in a YT video.
'They' learned that little black rectangle meant better sales. Oh its solar? THIS calculator will last forever ..or til the sun goes out. I'll buy it!!
Game Hazard graphing calculators are an absolute waste of money(Ti ones) Cpu chips has gotten pretty cheap so Idk why I am paying above 100 dollars for a potato cpu and a calculator that barely works (I had a Ti 84 plus c that broke on me 4 times whilst on warranty and once out of it)
DELTA Delta but its not as cool. I have 2 (technically 3) apps. They work better than any market calculator, but i cant say its custom made. I cant say it has every feature i could want!
I have an old air conditioning and heater thermostat which can be programmed for every day of the week at four different times. It is an old thing but does the job. Also, It is not intrusive like the new wifi ones. A few months ago, it stopped working, nothing on display. I disassemble it and checked all voltages and soldering, and everything looked OK. I took the microscope out and started poking around to see the signals coming out of the micro; nothing, it was dead. Then, I checked the realtime crystal oscillator, and it looked like the micro was trying to start it every two seconds. I ordered the part from Digi-Key and replaced the realtime clock. This fixed it. I could have bought a new one, but I like this one.
Many manufacturers use the same injection moulded frame for a range of calculators so it's cheaper to fill in the unused solar panel hole than it is to create a new mould.
I've just stumbled upon your video by chance and I gotta say I'm very grateful for it. I have learned today the answer that I've been searching my whole life regarding these devices. Sir, I salute you!
lmaooo wow not even an actual solar cell. i had no idea this was even a thing. you totally reminded me of covering up a solar calculator and watching the display fade out. man that takes me back hah
Memories!! I remember we had a really good, German-brand, real dual-power calculator in my childhood. I accidentally broke the solar cell as I was opening it up out of curiosity, and then it fell out… so I took a piece of paper and tried to draw a bad sketch of a solar cell and placed it right where the original was, because I was scared that my dad would notice. I think he must have, but he always made it appear as if he didn’t notice it. When I asked him about it when I got older, he said that he just didn’t want to upset me as a child and let me be creative and curious… I really have an amazing dad! 🥺
It is cheaper to just use the same casing for both solar and battery calculators. In the battery ones, they just put a fake solar cell in, and in solar an actual solar cell. Calc manufacturers have been doing this as long as solar calcs have existed..
That kind of makes sense, but it would make more sense if they didn't make the fake part look like a solar panel if they weren't trying to be misleading. I would also say they would only have been like that since extremely cheap solar calculators have been made. Decades ago, all calculators that looked like they were solar, were. But they weren't as cheap, and were often brand name.
I remember having a 'dual power' calculator many years ago and I deliberately took out the battery so it ONLY worked on solar power. Didn't feel like having to replace it all the time lol
I have a calculator like that, it takes 1 AA battery, I normally just use it as a solar only calculator, of there is no battery in there it cannot leak.
Fun fact; The reason the pocket calculator doesn't give 2 as the result of sqrt(2) * sqrt(2) is because it's using a truncated data type (or more likely, it's just doing binary addition using a simple ALU that cannot handle enough significant digits). A simplified example: sqrt(2) truncated to 3 digits = 1,41 1,41 * 1,41 = 1,9881
I was going to say something like this. Though it's in part because root 2 is irrational, so you would need to store an infinite number of decimal places to store it precisely, therefore any stored representation of it will always be a little bit out from the true value. Also if the displayed answer was limited to less decimal places than the input that would result in some rounding that would potentially give the answer as 2, which would be indicative of a cheaper, or at least more restricted one, rather than a better or more expensive one surely?
+Feroz It's a physical limitation of computers (for this example you can equate 'wires' with 'bits') We can use 1 wire to represent the numbers: 0 and 1 wire1 OFF (we may call this 0) ON (we may call this 1) we can use 2 wires to represent the numbers: 0 thru 3 just use all different combinations of ON and OFF to represent different numbers wire1 wire2 number OFF OFF (0) OFF ON (1) ON OFF (2) ON ON (3) we can use 3 wires to represent the numbers 0 thru 7 wire1 wire2 wire3 number OFF OFF OFF (0) OFF OFF ON (1) OFF ON OFF (2) OFF ON ON (3) ON OFF OFF (4) ON OFF ON (5) ON ON OFF (6) ON ON ON (7) and so on... To represent larger numbers, or more decimals, you need more wires but we can't use too many wires otherwise it might not fit in the calculator. This is why you get an error if you multiply with huge numbers with calculators, or get rounding errors with decimals.
Great video, but I don't get it. The fake panels add manufacturing expense... Is there really a driving market demand for dual power calculators? Or is this just manufactures re-using plastic molds from more expensive (real solar panel) models/brands to save on design costs?
Because changing the mold for the calculator would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. So they use the same form with a fake panel in it. IT doesn't change the actual function of the calculator at all.
This made me real curious about my own calculators, because I was sure I had one of those Big Display calculators! Obviously, I started with a Big Display calculator that looked almost identical to the silver one he opened at the very end. You know, the one that used to belong to Ms Dorothy Sheehy ? So I opened it up, and it looked EXACTLY like the silver Big Display calculator ... except it DID have a solar panel in it ! And it worked without the battery in it, so it was a REAL solar panel too. Talk about a surprise! I was not done with surprises though. I opened up my Texas Instruments Ti-30X II S ... probably cost me about 20 bucks, 15 years ago or so. And sure enough, it had both battery and solar panel inside, but the solar panel had a surprise in wait for me. Pulling the battery it still worked fine doing simple calculations, just like expected. But when you did complex stuff, the solar panel wasn't strong enough, or the capacitors were too small. It sure ran out of power quickly, but the panel was working. What an interesting surprise, this was turning out to be quite fun. But ... well, you can probably guess it already - I was not done with surprises just yet. I finally got my hands on oldest and most broken calculator, a Texas Instruments Ti-106. I bought it back in 1998, it has been with me in classrooms, at home, and in a gravel pit. It has been "dipped" in coffee or Sodapop more times than I can count. It has generally lived a hard life. Last time I lend it out to a friend, it came back with a broken display - But it still turns on. Only reason I hadn't thrown it out, was because I had put it in a spot where I had forgotten about it. So I opened it up to see if it really had a solar panel - And sure enough, it did have one .. a real one too. How do I know ? Because it doesn't have a battery. Just the solar panel !
Stumbled upon this again and realized I forgot to leave a comment of thanks. About 6 years ago I bought a calculator with a Solar cell for my father and this video was of help in determining which ones had an actual Solar cell. My criteria back then was decently big digits (at least 1in tall display), AA or AAA battery, and a Solar cell. While I was gone around stores to test calculators remembering to test the Solar panels using my phone flashlight and removing the included batteries which landed me on a Casio model that's still working today even after numerous drops. So thanks for making this video.
The days of putting your thumb over the solar cell and watching the display fade and calculator die are over
I had one that the reset button had broken on, so I used to hold my thumb on the cell for awhile to reset it. Made for some slow math homework 😂
@@seionne85 that sounds painful
@@sable4539 lol! it was painful when I pulled my thumb off too early and had to try again 😢
Gotta love how stuff like this lasts for years, but our phones expected to do so much with so little battery
@@seionne85 could have just done (number on calculator) - (same number) = 0
There are medical defibrillators: the modern ones have capacitors that don't make that high pitch, so some manufacturers have had to add sound chips, just because it's expected to make that noise to 'prove' that it's working.
so does ur mom
no u
It's not actually the capacitor bank that makes the whining, it's the HV charge circuit. Modern ones still whine, it's just above the range of human hearing.
Just like many modern cars has a speaker making the sound for the turn indicator, where in older cars it's the actual indicator relay that makes the click-clack.
Those are called skeuomorphs (mentioned in this video: ua-cam.com/video/xn7ZaT3AgoU/v-deo.html), they're the inclusion of features from old things in their successors. Such as the camera-shutter sound when taking a picture with a smartphone, the icon for calling being an old landline phone or the icon for email being an envelope. All skeuomorphs, purely to make the new things more familiar to people used to the older versions of these things.
“Why not just buy a new one?”
*”Well, I like this one.”*
I can’t agree more with this attitude. Making everything disposable has broken any concept of sentimental value of things to so many people.
I was asked the same thing when I had to borrow a screwdriver to open up my old TI-83, which had stopped powering on even with a fresh battery. Sure I can do most of my calculations on my computer/phone and I probably could find a used replacement for not that much but I like *my* calculator and frankly sometimes the inputs with real buttons are nicer than digital stuff. Turned out the only problem was that the metal arms connecting the battery to the board are just sort of pushed against some contacts and at some point a drop must have bent them just enough that they weren’t quite touching anymore. Used pliers and had it working perfectly again
acá en Latinoamérica eso no existe :v
Yup
it's also an environmental disaster
I like that calculator. That is a nice calculator.
01:02 - Most likely, the same case is also used for an actual solar-powered calculator. It's cheaper to just cover up the solar panel in the non solar-powered models than to make individual cases for each. You can also see that there are recesses for two button batteries, even though the specific model uses a single battery that is mounted directly to the circuit board. One case molding, different calculator models.
Exactly. Those calculators are as cheap as they are because the entire process -from market research to design to production to distribution- was done so as efficiently as possible. Money was saved every step of the way, and manufacturing is usually the most expensive part.
I think you read too much into this. The manufacturer just stole the design from others and made minimal changes to it. By the way, the silver calculators are precisely the ones with fake solar cells, so just don't buy silver ones.
Exactly!
@ 5:41 That's what we call a Jesus window!
1950: in the future we’ll have flying cars
2019: fake solar calculator
*2017
Here in the future, it gets worse.
@@boreaousx much worse
@@josephsagotti8786 so mush..... Better actually we got the Corona vaccine and life is slowly going back to normal
@@josephsagotti8786 much much worse
watching this on my solar calculator
Anu *LMAO*
🤣🤣
But those don’t play video
@@samstiles5166 wooosh
@@krisematics6501 that is a serious stretch
This is simultaneously the most interesting and boring video I have ever watched
Blue Breeze Blvd its interesting how he is trying to make power with solar panels by pointing at it with a lamp
Aaro Hyötyläinen light from Led lamps work as solar light.
You do know that "solar light" is basically the same os normal light, irhgt? Just with more frequencies in it's spectrum. If you have a solar cell that works with visibile light, you don't need to point it at the sun for it to work, a light bulb will do.
Blue Breeze Blvd I'm with you!
It's interesting but, that's it.
Blue Breeze Blvd hahaha omg I totally agree
When i was at Middle School, my mom gave me a Casio calculator that she used at high school. The device included a flip cover and had two way power. The only thing is that it had a dead battery, so I had to sit near the windows everytime I had a math exam. Similarly, I had a time limit to accomplish my math homework before nightfall or else my calculator wouldn’t turn on until the sun arises again.
Fortunately, years later I found a way to replace the dead battery and it was a nice feeling to be finally using my calculator at night for the first time.
Hey, I think I have that same one!
I know it's Casio.
Is it the kind where you need to hold the flip cover open or it returns closed under spring tension?
@@owenkegg5608i think i know what your talking about is it that red small one?
Why didn't you just replace the battery or get a new calculator. Work smarter not harder.
@@prisonbreakgamingI persume, as a middle schooler, he did not have the expertise to replace the battery or the money to buy a new one.
@@slashplane Teaching kids how to use scientific calculators while they don't even know how to change the battery. Perfectly describes our education system.
I don't understand how I catch myself watching 18 minute long videos from start to finish about how some calculators have fake solar cells. I have work in the morning. The fuck am I doing with my life
Oh hey, it's my sister's birthday too. Happy birthday!
Zoey B. living on the edge
Zoey B. lol same
Same, hahahahaha
Zoey B. Same. And I don't even use calculators, I use my phone.
I still use my gas powered calculator. Just changed the oil on it last night.
I've noticed every time I'm studying, my CO detectors go off, and I mysteriously fall asleep while running the calculator. I seem to wake up when the auto-off feature activates. Odd
This actually made me laugh lol
Haha, Will!
William P : OMG!! One of the best replies I've heard for a long time, haven't laughed so hard for ages😂😂👍👍
Andrew Martin I don't get it
Channel shutoff Loser. I HAVE COAL POWERED CALCUWAITER
I found 4 identical broken 'solar' calculators that had real panels, but the panels weren't wired at all. Made a small compound cell out of them, and it just barely powers a 'lucky cat' that used to be battery powered 😃
That's so wierd how they had the panels but never used it
Huh
I actually have seen this trend on cheap solar electrónics, i guess it's because solar controller chips and recargable batteries Increase the cost of the product so they only put the solar panel to look good.
I buyed a cheap small solar lamp and worked well for a year, the next year the lamp light become weaker even when i put the lamp for hours on the Sun, so i disesamble the lamp and found out that even when the solar panel was real it wasn't connected to the circuit.
I had never heard of the term "lucky cat", but somehow knew exactly what it was.
@@klystron2010 One of those solar powered cats that wave hello
this is absolutely hilarious because i had that exact same model of calculator, knocked it off the desk, and realized the solar panel was fake too.
amazing how something so specific happens to two completely different people by sheer chance.
and yes i also liked how the buttons feel
And here I am at 3 Am watching some guy cracking open god damn calculators to check if their solar cells are real
Adrijus VFX same xD
Adrijus VFX with a dope Yung Lean profile pic too 👌
Ayy
Oh boy 3 AM
s a d b o y hours.
I have suspicions about my solar powered abacus
my view my doesn't work in the sun so I think it's legit. I can't see it in the dark at all
:D :D :D :D :D
I’m dead.
my view my solar powered torch (flashlight) don't work goddamn it, any body got any ideas?
my view lol
I remember my first digital calculator. In the 1970s Radio Shack offered a four function LED calculator for $99 plus tax. I thought it was worth every penny. $100 in 1975 was equivalent to $485 today. Dollar Tree sell scientific calculators now for $1.00
damn
Did you have mechanical calculators back then?
This happens with everyting!! When its new its expensive
A good Texas Instruments graphing/advanced calculator can still go for a few hundred. Still overpriced in my opinion, but it’s mostly due to the proprietary hardware TI uses. They’re designed in such a way that all of the computations are performed by the chip architecture rather than logic patterns on a processor. Makes them super-duper-quick and efficient at mathematical calculations.
Cuz when you bought the calculator there were active patents then they expired and became super cheap
You have to admit it’s pretty amazing that all the design work, engineering, making expensive moulds, buying in the calculating chips and batteries, raw materials, manufacturing, assembly, packaging then international shipping, distribution more freight, then unboxing and loading onto shelves… and you can buy it for a dollar or two. Then we wonder why so much goes to landfill. It’s just crazy.
this never fails to blow my mind
the labor is subsidized by the government, the elected officials get elected by selling the idea of more jobs in their region to the voters, the voters commonly work jobs that are demanding enough but also simple enough to make them lower class at least for some period of time, the myriad volumes of cheap products constantly thrown away when the common folk suffer for long enough to earn something that is slightly less trash than the cheap products and the resulting cynicism, illness, and death from their earlier years removes a considerable amount of them from their identity as a voter and the cycle continues. its grim, i know. all the content out there on the internet doesnt actually help. the algorithms that direct you towards fun educational content also balance that out by cramming nonsense into your feeds. there is a phenomenon in competitive online videogames called skill based matchmaking or SBMM that is algoritmically pairing people with teammates that cause them to win as close to 50% of the time as possible for various reasons and the algorithms on sites like UA-cam work the same way. you and i and everyone else are all expendable, variables in an equation which serves the singular purpose of the sum of all things reaching zero (0). again, i apologize if it is grim, on an individual level it transforms from good thing to bad thing in a fluid sort of way but in a general sense it is actually kind of ruining the entire planet.
I once had a calculator that was so cheap, that instead of "fake solar cell" it had a freaking sticker, with solar cell image.
lol
That actually happens a lot, the plastic inset might be cheaper than the sticker though to produce.
actually makes sense, since they probably have plastic molds and no sticker production system, just using available plastic pellets would be cheaper than ordering stickers from someone else and having someone man that part.
Only in russia
Искандер Сайфуллин old solar calculators sucked. They only worked outside... But this is a con...
this dude is savage. I bet he didn't even ask to take that calculator from work
Blue Fang JSD is gonna be pissed that his calculator was taken and broken
Watch as he's steals a calculator from a bank.
Imagine a guy holding up a bank with nothing but a calculator in his hand, and he asks the person behind the counter for "all the calculators in the drawer and no one gets subtracted."
Taylor Westmore XDDDD
I dont know how it works where you guys live but here when you get a office you can do what you want with all the stuff the person before didnt bother to remove
I can now sleep in peace knowing calculators have fake solar cells, thank you
some*
My parents have one from the 90s that actually works. It has no batteries in it and only works when held in sunlight or under a lamp.
Same here. Before, my nights were tough trying to figure out the issues with calculators....
If you're being sarcastic, you're the one that clicked on this video.
Danny Khoo Calkalater*
One reason (that I can think of) for fake solar cells is that the original injection mold has a space for solar cells, but the factory no longer makes solar cells and uses batteries exclusively. Given that a new injection mold can cost upwards of $250,000 USD, it's better to just put in a fake solar cell than to build a new injection mold.
I think you may have cracked the code.
I had a real solar calculator for a long time. I always loved playing with the solar panel by covering it up and making it slowly fade out and power off then give it light again so it popped back on.
It hates you
It's like slowly smothering a baby :)
I had to get mine in fluorescent or natural light, in incandescent was hard to keep it fully on
@@petermuller608Bro what 😅
in the 80s my friends walkman stopped working. we took it apart. they had bass boast buttons. it was a noise clicker. it didn't do anything, just clicked real loud
BADD1ONE Usually the bass boost button just mutes the bass tones when it's not pushed in, so that if you dont turn it on the music sounds worse. Tricks people into thinking the bass boost is a good thing.
thats exactly what the youtube downvote button does. absolutly nothing, but they didnt want to remove it.
@@darkshadowsx5949happy now?
@@darkshadowsx5949...until now!
@@darkshadowsx5949this has sadly aged poorly six years on.
The diode at 13:20 is a backflow blocking diode. It is to prevent the solar cell from trying to change a non-rechargeable battery. There must have been a mistake in the PCB because they are most often part of the PCB. This was a fix so they could use the PCBs for this unit. Either that or the PCB was also used in a battery only unit but by adding the diode they could use it in this unit.
Yea, I think it's a bodge so they could use a non-rechargeable cell with a board designed to take a rechargeable one.
It's installed the other way. It's there to keep the battery from discharging into the solar cell. The solar cell isn't going to produce enough energy to do any harm to that button cell, but the solar cell does present a load to the battery when it's not producing, and they just wired them in parallel, probably because the chipblob board they used didn't have an isolated input for the solar cell. :/
@@SwervingLemoni think this is a more plasuable explanation. Since solar cells acts almost like an LED and will drain the battery continuously if without a diode
I never considered the possibility the "solar cells " were fake though i have wondered how they made them cheap enough to have them on such low cost calculators, so i am surprised they are faked but not exactly shocked.
Some (cheap if I remember correctly) calculators definitely do have real ones, though.
This is a good dude. He did everything he could to not break his former work buddy's calculator.
But it broke anyway. :(
@@andymadden8183 sadge
(Why am i replying to a 2 year old reply)
@@Damian-cilr2 cuz why not
@@anonymously_ dam striaght
He failed!
"I found this one at work." JSD's gonna be pissed lol
so he says
Studio Papa I posted comment before I got to the part where he explained that, but I suppose JSD could still be upset seeing his beloved former calculator being "ruined".
I was told I could listen to the radio at a reasonable volume.
Bootney Lee Farnsworth But they fired you and stole your calculator?
Dakota Canterbury I told Bill that if they move my desk one more time I'm quitting. I'll burn this place down.
Did I really just watch a video about calculators... and like it?
One-handed videos are a torment.
Me too bra
I suddenly have a question about those slot-in-your-front-door mail boxes, and couldn't those doors be pulled out of their frames with a piece of pipe, a chain and a truck. And maybe I've just found the right person to check this out.
Btw, I liked this video, too.
Your front door, mailbox or no, if made of wood, can be broken open by a couple of guys with $12 steel sledge hammers from Home Depot in about 20 seconds. Or using a drill with a keyhole bit and reciprocating saw in 2 minutes. Or can be opened without breaking with a $50 lock pick in maybe 6 minutes.
Paul Robinson Or just forget the door, grab a brick and smash a window.
i remember when i was doing an algebra test in high school. my calculator stopped working so i asked my professor if i could get up and use it next to the window so that i could continue calculating stuff. he accepted, and the calculator did indeed keep working as long as the sun kept hitting the small panel on it. my professor however did not trust his students at all so he basically stood behind me, staring at me and making sure i was not trying to cheat on the test (there were some other students sitting nearby and i could have theoretically given their tests a peek- but i did not for obvious reasons)
still odd that so many cheap calculators have dummy solar panels. mines actually worked, which is not uncommon, and helped me quite a bit. i loved that calculator... then i lost it. still have some odd memories associated to it, like the one i narrated just now.
ever seen a car with plastic covers over the cigarette lighters. because some models of car come with the cigarette lighters and others don't. it's the same situation here they use the same plastic mould. and the cheaper version doesn't come with the solar panel so they have to fill it with something and you get a piece of black plastic.
Thunderf00t sounds a lot different than he used to.
I'm glad I'm not the only one who got the Thunderf00t reference.
Clicking on this video, I honestly thought that it was a satire of Thunderfoot and he was going to do a fake "dubunk" of a calculator
I thought so too, but mainly because of the thumbnail.
Solar freaking calculators - busted
damn looks like i wasnt the only one. interesting how our subconsciousness picked it up as thunderfoot.
He simply disassembles and tests a few calculators but I found this the most entertaining video I've watched in a while!
+Adrian Miska:
I clicked on it because the thumbnail does not have big tits, bikini, and the text doesn't say "You won't believe what she did", "You won't believe what the cameraman saw", "the 10 greatest something something".
I bet the next video thumbnail you clicked on had big tits tho, these calculators would have gotten you in the mood and you have to finish the job.
Hilarious.
Adrian Miska IKR!
Adrian Miska i
*Mom* : What you watching?
Me: a guy taking apart calculators
Mom: *leaves* So that's what kids are up to these days
ChillBillYT better than drugs
Porn hub
LOL XD
Erick Rosa better than fortnite
Oh MOM... 😏
I do remember 6th grade math class, circa 2005, we had solar calculators. I could cover the panel and the calculator would dim out. They were pretty cheap as I recall
I remember having a Solar-only powered battery. It had like 1 millimeter of thickness and when I covered the panel with my finger during a calculation, it could do crazy things. (i.e. 3+3= 777777777...)
EDIT: I meant calculator, not battery. 3 years passed and I only now noticed the error.
Same
I wish those were still around
When I put my finger over one
88888888888 was what I saw
XDDDDDDDDD SO DRUNK (the calc not you)
Chewie Chewbacca that is because of the pixels
I always wondered why some solar calculators had an "off" button? Why the need to turn off a device that does not consume battery power? Now I know!
for OCD people who like things off
There is a reason: some (real) solar calculators are dual power (i.e. there is a battery in parallel to the solar panel, and the battery and solar panel have both a diode to prevent either one "recharging" the other).
If you leave the calculator ON in a drawer where there is no sunlight, you'll drain the battery :)
groszak1 that's not what OCD means.
I dont want my calculator ready to calculate all the time, but i could also imagine maybe for a real one, turning off the circuit could make it last longer
It's to save it using up the sun 😁
Solar FREAKING Calculators
star of duty fucking*
Ben Schaal i meant like the solar FREAKING roadways.
star of duty what are those?
Google it
star of duty you should say "They're solar freaking calculators!".
I had that telstar calculator as a kid. I dropped it, dislodged the "solar panel" and tried to fix it to great disappointment. It inspired a life long fascination with how things work, and all the secrets that hide in even the most mundane objects.
My mom had a calculator shaped after a credit card. ALMOST SAME THICKNESS. It was too thin to even have a battery, and could fit in any wallet. Lovely little calculator. Never seen any calculator like it after that.
I have tonnes of those. I seem to recall getting them in expensive Christmas crackers most of the time.
I still have a credit card radio I got from radio shack. It looks too thin to have a battery, but it does have one....
I remember those
I remember those. Radio shack used to sell some really nice calculators back in the day.
I have same calculator. He is over 30 years old and still works.
Dude, you could have put those Bazic buttons back any way you wanted! It wasn't broken, it was customizable!
Hey i like the way you think!
Crzygamer dumbass
Who's Molly?
lol then you lend it to someone and watch how long it takes them to work out the numbers are reversed.
You can FUCK WITH PEOPLE this way
just replace the MRC button with the EQUALS button and when you do a calculation, you input whatever numbers you want and press M+
then, you can just show it to people and do their calculation and when you press =, it will not compute whatever you inputed, it will show the answer to the previous calculation
I believe this was done in an episode of "The Real Hustle" where they set up a fake money exchange and they would do this to people where they would use a 10% smaller exchange transaction ratio than the real one, and when they showed it to people, "proving" it was 100% legit they managed to fool everyone into giving them less money for their exchange
noice
So this is what Ray Romano has been up to since the show ended!
I remember I had this calculator that was basically a clear thin piece of plastic and it had almost touch screen buttons and was powered completely on the solar panel. That thing was pretty cool
I love how genuinely passionate you are on the topic, I love this video and I’m about to watch more!
Simple things for simple minds.😆
Here I am, at 3 am, watching a video about calculators.
Jonasu :3 why did you copy Adrijus VFX why look for likes, theres no point
isaac tartaglia What I didn't look at the comments
Jonasu :3 ok well there's a comment at the top that reads exactly the same
Literally same
Jonasu :3 lol it's 3:28 am rn lol
Take a shot every time he says "Solar Cell"
Austin Villarreal Damnit, I was going to say that! XD
Zathanderwaffle Your pic matches your comment. X)
Edit: Actually both of your comments.
Dead in 3 seconds
Even though photovoltaic cell is more accurate XD
Candycorn 2014 Being more intelligent than you, he knew everyone would know what meant when he used the common and convenient term "solar cell" Effective speaking involves who the audience is. :)
When I was a kid I used to think every solar calculator was fake until I found a real one. Thin as a credit card so there was no room for a battery.
I discovered a phony solar cell a few years ago when I replaced the batteries in a Office Depot branded calculator. And that was a $10 calculator. My dad used to put his calculators in the windowsill because he thought the solar cell would recharge the battery.
wildbilltexas his old ones were probably real
They might have been in the 80's or 90's. But not the (cheap) recent ones. My father was a petroleum engineer and he went through calculators.
+wildbilltexas interesting choice of words.
Yea, but the real ones reduce battery usage not recharge it lol ;-)
It's crazy to me companies can sell solar yard lights for a dollar and then act like it's too expensive to put a much smaller solar cell on a calculator that costs more.
I'll have to check my solar powered sun dial.
Hiram Bright it's fake it has unclear power cell that will need replacing ever 160 years
what people still use sundials what is this 1985 hello McFly!!! tee hee! just kidding dude, chill out, no need to stop drop and roll, but anal sex is surprisingly nutritious my good lad ;)
What?
that started out funny, then it was weird . .
I have a chocolate calculator. The solar cell actually works. I had it since middle school. But i remember the display would dim if you covered the panel. I also made it glitch out one time like that.
Is it edible?
nice pfp
what do chocolate calculators do?
@@EriksGarbage They're just regular calculators that look and smell like chocolate
@@EriksGarbage Made out of choco
Actually separate plastic keys Is a more expensive design than a simple rubber membrane.
You're right, I AM shocked! I didn't know that this was a thing...
Also, I caught the homage to at least 3 different YT channels (was expecting puppets after the bongo riff). If only you had revealed the "chooch factor" of the calculators and made a Duke Nukem reference... :-)
Something inside me died a little… I am actually tempted to get my solar desk-calculator from the late 90s and open it up. Let's hope this one was still the real deal. I remember having a little solar calculator and when you blocked the Solar panel the LCD actually got dim. So that one must have been real.
KRAFTWERK2K6 twas just a solar sensor
bamboozled
japed
I had a legit solar calculator and it would fade when you cover up the panel
matteo murphy so did I
matteo murphy same those were the standard elementary school ones I think
Quit bragging.
That's true
Kids these days don't even know they're born.
Back in Korea^WNam^Wthe70's^Wthe day we used to hacksaw the tops offa 2n3055's and put them in bright sunlight to get 2uA into 1Meg load. But we were happy.
And healthy too. And we couldn't even spell Shokley properly - we still can't - because we had no light to learn by. Those were the days.
JSD will be pissed that you stole his calculator!
And then broke it. 😂
thrillscience school district
My best guess is that the manufacturer also produces another model of calculator with a functioning solar cell that uses the exact same molds for the case. It's cheaper to just cover up the slot with a thin plastic film than to shut down the supply line to change out the molds for ones without the slot.
that's exactly what it is. and a lot of the time the version with the solar panel is no longer sold. sudden they don't even bother anymore. remember this technologies decades and decades old. so if you're buying it from Walmart for $1 how much is Walmart buying it for? 10 cents
My life is a lie
Prince Wafflez my wife is a lie
I hope you're happy, JSD really liked that calculator, almost as much as the red Swingline stapler.
best movie ever haha
Now you watch, he's gonna burn the building down.
PC LOAD LETTER
Solar powered frigin' thorium calculators.
What about them?
BOPMD you're
I have a solar powered calculator. It also works with an LED desk lamp. It's Chinese, and has been working fine for almost 20 years.
The drums were very reminiscent of Techmoan, I felt as if I were about to see some puppets.
Yeah, hahahaha!
Your reply is still echoing with heavy British puppet accent in my mind.
Tayanç Tunca Molla batteries are annoying so people pick a solar one over a battery one all the time
Tayanç Tunca Molla . ,,,,, "LG, on,.
Tayanç Tunca Molla t(d
Thanks for your investigation. I just added a note to the Wikipedia "Solar-powered calculator" article about the dummy panels, and cited your video.
DanHarkless saw your edit
Hopefully neither it nor the citation of this video will be removed. Many Wikipedia editors slavishly remove all UA-cam-based citations, considering it an unreliable source. I say it's absurd to blanket-reject all UA-cam citations, since there are cases like this one where a UA-cam video is the best (or in some cases only) reference for a fact. Plus, common sense can tell you whether a video was likely to have been faked, and thus should not be considered a reliable source.
+DanHarkless Found it, 13:08 6 July 2017
+Nothing in Particular: Comments with URLs in them tend to get held to be moderated by the channel owner, but I believe notification emails still get sent at the time the comment is originally posted _(when_ they get sent -- I dunno if there's any logic to when they get sent and when they don't; I didn't receive an email when you replied, for instance, and just discovered your comment now), so that being said, here's the URL of the article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar-powered_calculator
DanHarkless - You have restored balance to what was once a poor excuse of a Wikipedia article. On behalf of the International Solar Calculator Society (ISCS), I thank you for your service.
This Visi-Flash has nothing to do with the video.
It's just for show.
RocketBossZach I'm jealous
16:00
He has a video on it if u want more info
Then continues to tell us I have a video on it
DID YOU OR SOMEONE YOU KNOW PURCHASE A SOLAR CALCULATOR BETWEEN 1989 AND 2001? IF SO YOU MAY BE ENTITLED TO A CASH SETTLEMENT.
i used to always take them apart and take the " solar panel " off cause after you removed some foam, wires and tint you got a very nice sharp glass rectangle that scratched almost everything, fun af
although they were pretty expensive school calculators so it probably was a real solar panel lmao
yeah that is what happens to the majority of my calculators.
i actually have a huge scar on my forearm from someone cutting me with those little glass rectangles lol
I thought i was the only one that did that XD
they work really good for parting out lines of flour on a cd case so you can sweat all the CoHoes at the party...u will be Mr. Popular quick after a stunt like that ....till they see its flour....
Heh. Going by the title alone in subs, I thought this was a smack-down rant from Thunderf00t.
same
Those "hit the highways" just don't add up! ;p
I did too!
First one... and then the other.
MattExzy I thought that too!
The TI calculators at school actually have real solar panels...
Poebat I should hope so, tis aren't cheap.... (or this cheap)
that's true too. Funny thing about those $1 calculators are that the button batteries cost more than they do... I haven't seen button batteries for $1 (at least were I live)
Poebat dollar tree or most dollar stores have 2032's and other button batteries usually 2 for a buck
so you're telling that all this time I've been spending way to much on button batteries....
Poebat Typically in manufacturing, they get a giant discount by buying in bulk.
The Bazic losing all its keys was reminiscent of some drunk guy spitting out all his teeth after starting a fight he couldn't finish.
Take a drink every time he says solar cell
*shot
I like my liver
Okay imma do it
Ih boi tis stuf id strng
Im soooo thirsty
Meek Pup gonna stay hydrated with all this water
Forget solar calculators. I'll stick with my coal powered calculator. Make Calculators Great Again.
Forget coal powered. Nuclear powered is the way to go!
RenovatioJuris get a 500hp leaded gas calculator. Thats what real men use
Laharl Krichevskoy How many calculations per gallon does yours get?
Mr. Krabs did you mean how many gallons per calculation? 😂
Mine runs on DIESEL fuel and a manual six-speed transmission! Argh, ARGHHH, ahahhh!
should gather as many little solar chips as you can and link them up to see how much power you can produce from your led light.
It'd be a very inefficient way of making any kind of worthwhile wattage or current, I expect... but it could certainly be a pretty interesting alternative to a traditional step-up transformer if you got, say, 100 of them and wired them all up in series. A 20x5 grid of PV strips wouldn't even be too large (well, after all, it's 400 of those little squares), but it would then put out 160 volts DC (at, thankfully, a low current, and without much in the way of stored energy behind) when that same light was shone at it. Or still a good few dozen in ambient lighting. Which could give you the ability to deliver mild, joke-shop grade static-esque shocks to random people using nothing but the power of available light and some very simple cabling.
However I bet there's a supplier somewhere that will sell you a literal bucket of the miniature PV strips, enough to make an entire business suit out of, for not very much money at all. You don't need the rest of the calculators, just the PVs. A few thousand of those in series, and assuming it doesn't exceed some kind of breakdown voltage in the cells (as far as each is concerned after all, they've only got 1.6v across them, even if that IS the difference between 230v and 231.6v) and is properly insulated, you could start emitting solar-powered plasma-ball style mini lightning and glows as you turn any nearby light into multiple-kilovolt glows and sparks.
I wonder even if it would be enough for the Emperor's sith-lightning effects from Return of the Jedi. It need not carry quite so much paralysing power, just... yknow... be lightning shot from the fingers with no obvious central power source. Hmm..
It produces just enough power to power the calculator. My solar calculateor won't last 10 extra seconds without sunlight
Mark Penrice what I read "blah blah blah technology stuff blah blah blah."
In early 2000s solar calculators really were solar calculators
I think this video just saved my life. I am sharing this. People need to know.
lol
Me too. I was sitting on the edge of a building rethinking my life when I saw this video.
I wonder what JSD from work would say if he saw this video and found that his solar calculator vanished from the office just to be butchered in a YT video.
Corisco tupi aqui, q aleatório
@@whereisthecookie4065 Quem diria. kkk
ohh dear, my dollar store calculator that has been running on the same batteries for 6 years has a fake solar cell..I hope I can sleep at nite
Ha nice reply
oh no thats horrible
Kim Sleep
Kim Sleep I say that's a good battery.
HAHA that was literally my reaction
'They' learned that little black rectangle meant better sales. Oh its solar? THIS calculator will last forever ..or til the sun goes out. I'll buy it!!
Here I am watching a guy crack open calculators at 5 in the morning
Lego4birds try 2:21 am
3:33 AM here..
DeZo Try 8 am
3:16 AM
Lego4birds same but at 6 am
who doesn't like calculator unboxings? 😂👌
You, sir, should check out Matt Parker of Standup Maths. He's got some truly great tongue-in-cheek calculator unboxings.
The one in a box cost twice as much.
TOP 10 ANIME BETRAYALS
SuperCasualGuy! Joke is old -_-
Gatling Hawk Not years old.
Not only is it old, it was never funny.
This humor is dated.
normie jokes
I bought a solar calculator, it doesn't tell me where the sun, moon, or any of the planets are located.
With all these busted calculators you can make your own special one with everything you would ever want!
pyromaniac000000 a full color graphing/scientific calculator with HD rainbow six siege.
Game Hazard graphing calculators are an absolute waste of money(Ti ones) Cpu chips has gotten pretty cheap so Idk why I am paying above 100 dollars for a potato cpu and a calculator that barely works (I had a Ti 84 plus c that broke on me 4 times whilst on warranty and once out of it)
pyromaniac000000 Just download an app
DELTA Delta but its not as cool. I have 2 (technically 3) apps. They work better than any market calculator, but i cant say its custom made. I cant say it has every feature i could want!
Always buy a CASIO™ calculator
Most of the time, I'm using my phone's calculator or I'm using the calculator in Windows. I use a TI-84 Plus for school though.
RAZ3R yea :)
CASIO fx-82AU PLUS II boi
FluorescentGreen5 fuck yeah bro
Sharp ELW516XGBSL Write View!
Recognize!
that BASIK caculator was so BASIK it didn't want to exist
Basik bitch.
*Bazic* bitches.
I have an old air conditioning and heater thermostat which can be programmed for every day of the week at four different times. It is an old thing but does the job. Also, It is not intrusive like the new wifi ones. A few months ago, it stopped working, nothing on display. I disassemble it and checked all voltages and soldering, and everything looked OK. I took the microscope out and started poking around to see the signals coming out of the micro; nothing, it was dead. Then, I checked the realtime crystal oscillator, and it looked like the micro was trying to start it every two seconds. I ordered the part from Digi-Key and replaced the realtime clock. This fixed it. I could have bought a new one, but I like this one.
A moment of silence for JSDs Victor calculator. It was sacrificed in the name of science, and its legacy will be engraved in my mind forever
Rip jsd u will be missed
When I saw this video in my inbox I thought it was a EEVblog or Thunderf00t video.
Solar Roads BUSTED
THE WORLD NEEDS THIS MAN
Mom: What are you still watching on the phone?
Me at 3 am : It's complicated....
Many manufacturers use the same injection moulded frame for a range of calculators so it's cheaper to fill in the unused solar panel hole than it is to create a new mould.
Bingo!
That's a good guess. But it's also possible they've tested sales of calculators with and without solar blanks and have found the former sell better.
I've just stumbled upon your video by chance and I gotta say I'm very grateful for it. I have learned today the answer that I've been searching my whole life regarding these devices. Sir, I salute you!
Adi D. Now we can live in peace
how did I get here and why am I still watching
lmaooo wow not even an actual solar cell. i had no idea this was even a thing.
you totally reminded me of covering up a solar calculator and watching the display fade out. man that takes me back hah
It's worth watching just for the Chinese musical calculator bit.
SOLAR FREAKIN' CALCULATORS!
man
Both companies are a lie!
Very common
I thought this was a Thunderf00t video at first.
Yeah, the thumnail made me think that this is Thunderf00t.
Michael MacEachern they should do a collab
same
Memories!! I remember we had a really good, German-brand, real dual-power calculator in my childhood. I accidentally broke the solar cell as I was opening it up out of curiosity, and then it fell out… so I took a piece of paper and tried to draw a bad sketch of a solar cell and placed it right where the original was, because I was scared that my dad would notice. I think he must have, but he always made it appear as if he didn’t notice it. When I asked him about it when I got older, he said that he just didn’t want to upset me as a child and let me be creative and curious… I really have an amazing dad! 🥺
It is cheaper to just use the same casing for both solar and battery calculators. In the battery ones, they just put a fake solar cell in, and in solar an actual solar cell. Calc manufacturers have been doing this as long as solar calcs have existed..
That kind of makes sense, but it would make more sense if they didn't make the fake part look like a solar panel if they weren't trying to be misleading. I would also say they would only have been like that since extremely cheap solar calculators have been made. Decades ago, all calculators that looked like they were solar, were. But they weren't as cheap, and were often brand name.
I remember having a 'dual power' calculator many years ago and I deliberately took out the battery so it ONLY worked on solar power. Didn't feel like having to replace it all the time lol
I have a calculator like that, it takes 1 AA battery, I normally just use it as a solar only calculator, of there is no battery in there it cannot leak.
Fun fact;
The reason the pocket calculator doesn't give 2 as the result of sqrt(2) * sqrt(2) is because it's using a truncated data type (or more likely, it's just doing binary addition using a simple ALU that cannot handle enough significant digits). A simplified example:
sqrt(2) truncated to 3 digits = 1,41
1,41 * 1,41 = 1,9881
I was going to say something like this. Though it's in part because root 2 is irrational, so you would need to store an infinite number of decimal places to store it precisely, therefore any stored representation of it will always be a little bit out from the true value. Also if the displayed answer was limited to less decimal places than the input that would result in some rounding that would potentially give the answer as 2, which would be indicative of a cheaper, or at least more restricted one, rather than a better or more expensive one surely?
Yeah, I was thinking the same thing.
Jerri Kangasniemi
I don't understand what you said but I liked your research about it.
+Feroz
It's a physical limitation of computers
(for this example you can equate 'wires' with 'bits')
We can use 1 wire to represent the numbers: 0 and 1
wire1
OFF (we may call this 0)
ON (we may call this 1)
we can use 2 wires to represent the numbers: 0 thru 3
just use all different combinations of ON and OFF to represent different numbers
wire1 wire2 number
OFF OFF (0)
OFF ON (1)
ON OFF (2)
ON ON (3)
we can use 3 wires to represent the numbers 0 thru 7
wire1 wire2 wire3 number
OFF OFF OFF (0)
OFF OFF ON (1)
OFF ON OFF (2)
OFF ON ON (3)
ON OFF OFF (4)
ON OFF ON (5)
ON ON OFF (6)
ON ON ON (7)
and so on...
To represent larger numbers, or more decimals, you need more wires but we can't use too many wires otherwise it might not fit in the calculator. This is why you get an error if you multiply with huge numbers with calculators, or get rounding errors with decimals.
Great video, but I don't get it. The fake panels add manufacturing expense... Is there really a driving market demand for dual power calculators? Or is this just manufactures re-using plastic molds from more expensive (real solar panel) models/brands to save on design costs?
Because it tricks people into thinking it will work forever, when in reality it will only work for 2 or 3 years before you have to disassemble it
Because changing the mold for the calculator would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. So they use the same form with a fake panel in it. IT doesn't change the actual function of the calculator at all.
This made me real curious about my own calculators, because I was sure I had one of those Big Display calculators!
Obviously, I started with a Big Display calculator that looked almost identical to the silver one he opened at the very end.
You know, the one that used to belong to Ms Dorothy Sheehy ?
So I opened it up, and it looked EXACTLY like the silver Big Display calculator ... except it DID have a solar panel in it !
And it worked without the battery in it, so it was a REAL solar panel too.
Talk about a surprise!
I was not done with surprises though.
I opened up my Texas Instruments Ti-30X II S ... probably cost me about 20 bucks, 15 years ago or so.
And sure enough, it had both battery and solar panel inside, but the solar panel had a surprise in wait for me.
Pulling the battery it still worked fine doing simple calculations, just like expected.
But when you did complex stuff, the solar panel wasn't strong enough, or the capacitors were too small.
It sure ran out of power quickly, but the panel was working.
What an interesting surprise, this was turning out to be quite fun.
But ... well, you can probably guess it already - I was not done with surprises just yet.
I finally got my hands on oldest and most broken calculator, a Texas Instruments Ti-106.
I bought it back in 1998, it has been with me in classrooms, at home, and in a gravel pit.
It has been "dipped" in coffee or Sodapop more times than I can count.
It has generally lived a hard life.
Last time I lend it out to a friend, it came back with a broken display - But it still turns on.
Only reason I hadn't thrown it out, was because I had put it in a spot where I had forgotten about it.
So I opened it up to see if it really had a solar panel - And sure enough, it did have one .. a real one too.
How do I know ?
Because it doesn't have a battery.
Just the solar panel !
I want this video to get to #1 on trending
the ASMR is strong with this one
RollinLikeABetch ASMR is a bodies reaction to certain sounds, mostly quiet in nature.
Stumbled upon this again and realized I forgot to leave a comment of thanks.
About 6 years ago I bought a calculator with a Solar cell for my father and this video was of help in determining which ones had an actual Solar cell. My criteria back then was decently big digits (at least 1in tall display), AA or AAA battery, and a Solar cell.
While I was gone around stores to test calculators remembering to test the Solar panels using my phone flashlight and removing the included batteries which landed me on a Casio model that's still working today even after numerous drops.
So thanks for making this video.