<p>I’m going into my senior year of engineering next year and I was wondering what you guys use your graphing calculators for.</p>
<p>So far I’ve used it in engineering thermo mainly for interpolations from steam tables (sophmore). In my junior year I used it my a variety of classes which involved solving difficult equations without iterations. This gave me a few minutes extra on tests but honestly, i think that even if I didn’t have the calculator and interated instead i wouldn’t lose too many marks.</p>
<p>Am I using my Ti-89 to its potential? I get the feeling that I’m not.</p>
<p>do you know of any other uses for it? My only use is solving equations and i get the feeling that even if i had a ti-83 instead i still wouldn’t be using it nearly to its potential.</p>
<p>I have never used anything but a ti-30. Most the people use this to store formulas and notes. No wonder the average is high 70’s. I strongly oppose the use of graphing calculators in math classes. its a menace in disguise. </p>
<p>Other than that, it had many advantages. you should get a book, perhaps the dummies one, its good.</p>
<p>Can anyone please clarify the argument against having a Ti-89 for calculus and diffeq? Yes, Maple is faster and can do more sophisticated mathematics. But a TI-89 is easier to use (for simple problems) and is much more portable. It’s nice to be able to do some integrals on the fly without lugging around a laptop and having to boot it up and open maple. </p>
<p>The TI-89 is also useful for cranking out exact solutions to (simple) differential equations or taking some laplace transforms. I’ve actually found that the TI-89 isn’t quite advanced enough for my needs, because it cannot do symbolic work with the Heaviside step function, and I have not figured out how to do Lebesgue integrals with it. </p>
<p>Also the number of professors that allow calculators on exams is much greater than the number that accept laptop usage.</p>
<p>A) I have not had a single math class in college that allowed ANY calculator on quizzes/exams, let alone a graphing calculator.</p>
<p>B) Sure, Maple/Matlab/etc are more capable, but have a larger learning curve, and have to use a computer, while a TI-89 fits in your pocket need be (unless you are female, and thus have tiny pockets).</p>
<p>C) I have used my TI-89 a ton in my fluids classes because there are just so many ridiculous integrals. Is this the most advanced use of a TI-89? No. But it sure does save me time. I know how to do the integrals by hand, but why do it when you don’t have to?</p>
<p>D) I got my 89 titanium for free, so I don’t really feel bad about spending so much on a calculator and not using it to its potential. <em>shrug</em></p>
<p>your fluids class has analytical integrals to solve?</p>
<p>Ya…now that i think about it, i’ve had classes where i had to solve integrals by hand for a test but the hardest part was setting them up so the calculator wouldn’t help…i think.</p>
<p>Yeah, but I have taken quite a few extra advanced fluids classes since that is what I am starting grad school in next fall. The ME department only requires 1 fluids class, but I have taken 3, plus an advanced heat transfer class that necessarily also has plenty of fluids. You would be surprised how many ridiculous integrals you can come up with when using the Navier-Stokes equations.</p>
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<p>I think if you reread my post, you will see where I said math classes. I have only had one EE class since I am not an EE, and we could use a graphing calculator, but not a laptop.</p>