How to Emulate a Graphing Calculator on Your Phone or PC
I feel like graphing calculators were really the “thing” for most people in that year or two in high school when you were forced to use them in whatever math class you took. It finally felt like you were getting old – that is, as a teenager – when everyone pulled out their bulky animals on the first day of school to see whose parents dumped for insanely bizarre models.
These massive TI – ## devices aren’t particularly sexy, but they speak of a special era: when the best thing you could do to distract yourself during your school day is to sneakily launch a copy of Drugwars . The dependable TI-83 has been my lifesaver during the boring periods of my last two years in high school, and it’s fair to say that we honor these handheld rescuers during Lifehacker Analog Imaging Week . For all the hours I spent playing Snake during class, it went well.
Emulate your graphing calculator on your PC
If you don’t have the money to spend on a graphing calculator, or just want to play around with it for nostalgia, there are many different tools you can use to simulate their capabilities on other platforms. Long-standing ticalc.org has an excellent list of emulators for Windows and Mac, and these are their best-of-breed recommendations for various Texas Instrument models:
- TI-84 Plus CE: CEmu
- TI-83 Plus and TI-84 Plus family (including TI-84 Plus C Silver Edition):jsTIfied and Wabbitemu
- TI-89, TI-92 Plus and Voyage 200: TiEmu
- TI Nspire: Firebird
Emulate your graphing calculator on your smartphone or tablet
I guess it makes sense to simulate a graphing calculator on a smartphone. After all, why carry two devices with you if you don’t need to? On Android, try Graph 89 Free – although you’ll need a .ROM image to get it to work (something you can grab from your graphing calculator, or be sure to find somewhere else ). Mathlab’s Graphing Calculator + Math, Algebra & Calculus app is a great way to get similar functionality on your smartphone, even if it doesn’t mimic the exact look and feel of your calculator. To do this, you can also check the app version of the aforementioned Wabbitemu , which simulates a wide range of different graphing calculators: TI-73, TI-81, TI-82, TI-83, TI-83 Plus, TI-83 Plus Silver Edition, TI-84 Plus, TI-84 Plus Silver Edition, TI-85 and TI-86. It even comes with an installation wizard to help you create the .ROM file you need to get it going.
As far as iOS goes, you won’t find a great emulator for the TI calculators that you probably used (or were asked to use). There are other apps that offer graphing calculator features such as GraphNCalc83 ($ 6), Graphing Calculator Plus ($ 5), and Desmos . They are as close as possible to the hardware graphing calculator on your iPhone or iPad, even if they are not direct copies of the graphing calculator’s user interface and functions.
Where can I find apps and games for my calculator (or calculator emulator)?
I am – and have long been a fan of the vast archives of graphing calculator programs at ticalc.org . If you don’t know where to start, they even have great “best” lists that you can use to find out what’s popular in the graphing calculator … er … scene.
I also think the Omnimaga forums / file repositories are a great place to find some robust calculator RPGs among other noteworthy programs (like Game Boy emulators, which can be much more fun to install on your device than games written specifically for a calculator .). In addition, Cemetech is a large comprehensive and regularly updated archive of programs, which is a rarity in the world of graphing calculators.
The / r / ti84hacks subreddit is a good place to start getting program recommendations for this particular calculator. It’s worth scanning Reddit to see if your graphing calculator (or the one you’re simulating) has its own subreddit. (There is even a subreddit dedicated to Texas Instruments devices in general.)
BTW, TI84CalcWiz has a decent selection of games and apps, but it’s unclear if this site is getting more updates. And if you’re using an HP graphing calculator, hpcalc.org is your ticket.