Backfill · 2024
#49 of 363Texas Instruments TI-84
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Texas Instruments
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Personal photo: A graphing calculator with a small monochrome screen showing a parabola, sitting on a notebook next to a pencil, with the familiar gray casing and colored function keys visible.
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The TI-84 graphing calculator has looked the same since the early 2000s. Texas Instruments still sells a device with a 96x64 pixel screen for $100 in 2024, which says everything about how institutional lock-in works. Every AP math and science class requires one. Textbooks reference its specific button layout. Teachers build curriculum around its functions. The buttons have a satisfying click, and the device runs for months on 4 AAA batteries. That's reliability phones can't match during a 3-hour exam.