The production of the Elektronika’s MKU-1 eight-digit microcalculator began at Kalkulyator (Svetlovodsk, Ukraine) in 1987. In Russian, MKSh stands for “school microcalculator”. It was made to help secondary school students study computation methods and tools, and also solve mathematical problems. Hard-wearing and easy to use, the MKSH-2 came in several colours.
The calculator’s power consumption is 42V. There were two reasons why a 220V adapter was not used. Firstly, as the device was aimed at school students, it was considered the safer option. Secondly, educational facilities used to (and still do) outfit their specialised classrooms with 42V sockets. There was also a home version — the Elektronika MKU 1-1 — that shipped with a 220V line adapter.
The calculator features an IV-18 vacuum fluorescent display and 24 keys — each with a dual function (enabled with the “F” key), allowing the device to perform a total of 29 operations. These included: addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, calculation of trigonometric, algebraic, and exponential functions, as well as of roots of quadratic equations. Calculations could be made with either a natural or floating point.
The only difference between this calculator and the MKSH-2M, was the shape of the casing.
From 1990, the calculator went by the model name of Elektronika MKU-1.
Weight: 1.0 kg (exc. batteries)
Dimensions: 250×180×78 mm.
