I am a trained accountant, although I don't now work in that field, so you might reasonably assume that I am good at mental arithmetic. Now this would be a mistake! Even when my mother was suffering with dementia her mental arithmetic skills remained very fast and very accurate but sadly I don't take after her!

I have also found that, as I grow older, my eyesight is gradually getting worse and I don't see small figures or letters as well as I might.

It was with these things in mind that hubby treated me to a decent sized calculator in the form of a Casio MS-8TV Desk Calculator, I have no idea how much he paid for it, as it is now a couple of years old, but it is currently on sale at Amazon for £3.49.

The calculator is dark grey and pretty standard looking - more about that later. It measures approximately six inches by four inches. The top of the calculator where the numeric display is shown is angled towards the user making it much easier to read than if it was completely flat. The calculator is dual powered - battery (which I have never yet had to replace) and solar power. There is a small solar panel across the top of the machine above the display panel.

There was a small instruction manual but I didn't take any notice of it to be honest. I have been using calculators since they were first commercially available so I don't think I need instructions on how to use one after all these years!

The buttons on this calculator are nice and big too so it is easy to use - I find that with the ones where the buttons are small, as I touch the numbers that I intend to touch, my fingers catch the buttons around it and mistakes are made.

The first button to use is the 'on' button situated top left which switches the calculator on so it is ready for use. There are of course the ten digits 0 to 9 (in light grey) with a double sized plus button, minus, multiply, divide and equals. There is a memory function on the calculator with three buttons - memory recall, memory plus and memory minus. The calculator has the usual AC and C buttons (in pink) to cancel either the latest entry or the whole calculation. There is also a +/- button which means that you can do your calculations in negative numbers if you want to. All the function buttons are black apart from the ones that I have specifically mentioned.

The calculator can also be used to work out tax although this is not something I have ever used. What you can do is to press the percentage rate set button for a couple of seconds and the current tax rate set in the machine will be displayed on your screen, you can then type in the tax rate that you want to use and press the rate set button again, that tax rate is now set in your calculator.

You are now able to apply this tax rate to an amount typed into the calculator by just pressing one of the two tax buttons (in light green) at the top of the calculator, tax- or tax+. Doing this then either adds or subtracts the percentage that you have saved as you tax rate from the total.


To be honest, when hubby bought this calculator for me, I was a bit surprised as I already had one or two little ones about the house and I couldn't understand why he would waste his money on a new one for me. Having used it I have found it to be much better than the little ones I have! It is easy to use with the buttons being so easy to press without the mistakes mentioned earlier in this review, the display is easy to read even in low light which is important for me and the whole thing is a robust design meaning that when it (occasionally) gets knocked off the edge of the table it comes to no harm.

For a basic calculator at a reasonable price that does a good job I don't think you can go wrong with this one especially if, like me, you have difficulty using the smaller ones.

A definite recommendation from me!