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I wanted to give everyone an update on what calculator we decided to buy for my son for high school this year. We bought the NumWorks Calculator and are planning on him using it unless his teacher will not let him. As a back up calculator I bought the TI-84 Plus CE at Target on Sunday, since it is on sale this week for $99.99. We are going to take the TI-84 Plus CE back if he is allowed to use the NumWorks calculator, but I wanted to get it at $99.99 instead of having to potentially pay the full $139.99 price. Target offers a 30-day return policy on the calculator, so we will be able to take it back after his first week of school if he doesn't need it.

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I had already bought the TI-Nspire CX at our local Office Max for $103.91 + tax a week or so ago, but we are going to return it. It is a nice calculator and seems easy to use in some ways and more complicated in others. The documents feature seems overly complicated for a calculator, but maybe it is needed in some situations that I am not thinking of at the moment.

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Another thing that seems weird about the TI-Nspire CX is when you divide two numbers. If you put in 3 divided by 8 you would think you would get the answer of 0.375, but instead you get 3/8, which is what you entered in the first place. To get 0.375 for the answer you need to remember to use one of the three methods mentioned in the How to convert between fractions and decimals for TI Nspire CX video. I am guessing there is a reason for 3/8 = 3/8, but it seems odd to me.

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TI-Nspire CX's touchpad for moving the cursor around the screen doesn't seem that great based on the Texas Instruments TI-Nspire Review video I found. The TI-Nspire CX emulator is not bad to navigate on my PC with my mouse, but I am not sure how well the actual calculator will work with the little trackpad in the middle of the directional buttons.

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It is nice that the TI-Nspire CX calculator spells out things with full titles instead of what looks like function names on the TI-84 Plus CE. For example, to calculate an "Integral" you need to hit the following buttons on each calculator:

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TI-84 Plus CE: "MATH" > "9:fnInt("

TI-Nspire CX: "menu" > "4 Calculus" > "2 Numerical Integral"

NumWorks: "Toolbox" > "Calculations" > "int(f(x),x,a,b) - Integral"

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This is just one example, but you can see how the TI-84 uses older naming with not a lot of letters for the titles. The TI-Nspire CX isn't bad once you know which menu to look under, but the NumWorks calculator seems easier to use and they show you both the long name and the formula.

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I really recommend downloading the three emulators for these calculators at the following links and trying them yourself to see how they will work before buying one.

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• NumWorks Online Simulator
  
• TI-SmartView Emulator Software for the TI-84 Plus Family
  
• TI-Nspire CX CAS Student Software - 30-day Trial
  
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  Watch some videos on each on YouTube and try to figure out how to solve some problems that you find online to see which is easiest to use. The TI-84 Plus CE and the TI-Nspire CX we needed to follow instructions to get the answers to problems. Once we read the instructions for the problems for the TI calculators it was sometimes funny how easy it was to find the answer on the NumWorks. I had to do a little search for how to do a couple of things on the NumWorks, but everything was straightforward and made sense. I don't know if we are missing something and there will be things that are more complicated on the NumWorks, but currently it seems the easiest to use.
  
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  I'm also not a fan of how the TI-Nspire CX buries the "sin", "cos", "tan", "abs", "square root", etc. functions under the "trig >" and "symbols" (not sure what to call it) buttons. I guess it is easy to use them once you find them, but I like how the TI-84 and NumWorks have those functions and others visible on the calculator either on a button or above a button that you access with the "2ND" or "shift" keys.
  
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  My son, wife, and I went through a few more problems the other day and every time the NumWorks seemed the easiest to use without any or much help from searching on Google. The NumWorks calculator just seems more intuitive to use and things make sense. 3/8 on the NumWorks equals 3/8 = 0.375. The NumWorks even says that 6/16 equals 3/8 = 0.375 without pressing any special buttons. The TI-84 Plus CE says it is equal to 0.375 and the TI-Nspire CX says it is 3/8 unless you go through the steps mentioned in the video above, but then you just get 0.375 without 3/8. The NumWorks gives you both answers right from the start, since the developers must've determined you might need both. Do you see what I mean about the NumWorks being more intuitive?
  
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  I really recommend the NumWorks calculator if you are allowed to use it at your high school. If you don't trust me, then try the online version or download it for your iPhone/iPad or Android device for free and see for yourself. I think you will be surprised at how well it works and how old it makes the TI-84 Plus CE and even the TI-Nspire CX feel. Engadget says "NumWorks graphing calculator is made for students raised on tech" and I would agree with that statement. I also agree with Romain Goyet, the creator and head of Numworks, when he says "If you give students something that's 25 years old, it's going to seem complicated to them." The TI-84 Plus CE seems complicated and like it was made back in the 1990s. The NumWorks graphing calculator seems like something that was made in 2017 and a lot easier to use.