Re: Dead TI83?

Mon, 07 Jun 2021 16:34:16 +0000

Never mind. It turns out that even though the 4 AAAs weren't completely flat, they were flat enough to where the TI83 wouldn't use them. Swapped in 4 new Energizers and it works perfectly well. A battery tester said the old ones were all 'low' on its scale.

Weird. I heard these let you know when the batteries were dying, maybe that's just the TI83+. Anyway, I'm glad it was such an easy fix, I did a self test and it had no problems.

Dead TI83?

Mon, 07 Jun 2021 10:39:20 +0000

Hey,
This is my first post on the forum but I've been lurking on the wiki since September, when I got my TI83.

Here's the deal then. After my maths teacher babied everyone into buying a Casio FX-991EX Classwiz at the start of the year (I'm from the UK, in Year 12 or the first year of Sixth Form/the end of high school), I knew there had to be a better thing on offer for less than the £34 the 991 cost. Plus, I already had an old 991ES Plus, but the LCD had pressure damage.

Knowing TI calculators were as cool as they are, I went looking on eBay and managed to score a 1996 TI83 for £27.50. All the controls are completely different from the Casios that rule the roost over here, but it was pretty intuitive and I got programming pretty quickly.

Sometimes though, before an exam, I had to reset it. Every time I've tried doing this, there's been a problem. I go into the memory menu and reset all, but instead of saying 'memory cleared' like I know they're supposed to say, the screen just gets wiped blank and it pretty much bricks itself, nothing when pressing the on button.

I managed to fix it once before by using the old 'yank a battery out and press clear' trick, but that didn't work this morning, no matter how hard I tried (I'm doing two exams today, thankfully the 991 is still alive) . But it kinda sucks. All the AAs have around 1.2V, the CR1620 has 2.9. I tried taking all the AAs out and leaving it for five minutes, and when I turned it on, it flashed a black screen for a fraction of a second, then died again. Unfortunately I wasn't lucky enough for it to be a contrast problem, because it doesn't look like it'll boot at all.

So I've got two questions for you guys - any idea what this is, and how would I go about fixing it? My best guess is the OS somehow got corrupted but it isn't a TI83+, so by my understanding, the OS is in the ROM and can't be messed with externally(?) I don't have a link cable, they're pretty scarce in the UK but even if I did, I'm not sure how I'd reflash it.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.