Advice to the young people

[filburt1]

Do not ever do the following:
1. Remove all screws from a TI-83 calculator
2. Take an external battery pack that holds four AA batteries (remember a TI-83 uses AAA) and populate it with four fresh new batteries
3. Connect the positive terminal of the pack to the positive connection on the calculator circuit board
4. Ditto, except negative to negative
5. Touch the wire

I not only burned myself (well I felt pain of some sort) but also smelled the aroma of burning printed circuit board. Rest assured my little baby is in graphing heaven right now. Thankfully I think it was dead anyway, and I have another calculator and haven't used this one for two years.

Either that or the thing would be graphing at a hellishly fast speed

[filburt1]

Ya know I think I just found out what happened: the calculator was expecting 6 V, 150 mA...I gave it 6 V, 6000 mA, whoops

[Erwin]

The words of the wise... thank you, sensei.

[filburt1]

I was terrified for weeks after something in elementary school (kids don't do this either ):
1. Get a D-Cell battery (one of those big-ass huge barrel-sized things)
2. Take a thin gauge wire and connect one end to the negative end
3. Connect the other end to the positive end
4. Touch the wire

That actually did burn me. The objective was to get a lightbulb to light but instead it scared the living s*** out of me

[filburt1]

Ah yes, my last electrical tale to which to regale you tonight:
1. Open up your computer while it's running
2. Connect two copper wires to one of the 12 V power connectors coming off the power supply
3. Get distracted and let the two get pulled down by gravity and happen to touch the metal case at the same time

There were actual sparks from that (couple months ago), the computer fan spun way down, and the lights dimmed a bit. Suffice to say I never hit the power switch faster

I was trying to get an old LED display working (you know, those numeric ones) that I had ripped out of an old 386 case and one thing led to another...

[Mystic Gohan]

LMAO my good old TI-83 is in my closet right now. I will not do any of the things you posted ok

[Tony G]

I have one too, damn expensive things. Don't need it until next year though.

[Xenon]

Best tip is to always use gloves

[Chris M]

Best tip is not to do anything

Satan

[filburt1]

OMG IT STILL WORKS

I used AAA batteries instead and tried to turn it on and it's working perfectly! Maybe I can use this puppy in a computer mod...after all it has a nice screen