If you are considering buying MathCad to solve some fancy mathematical problems, I recommend looking at SMath Studio first. The reason is simple. MathCad will cost you several hundred dollars. SMath Studio is freeware and provides a powerful mathematical program that comes with a WYSIWYG editor and completely supports units of measurement. In addition, you are getting numerous computing features and a rich user interface translated into about 40 languages. And last but not least, SMath Studio also contains an integrated mathematical reference book.
Should you need more, you can easily extend the application based on your needs. A built-in Extensions Manager allows you access to hundreds of official and third-party resources. And if all this still doesn’t satisfy your needs, you can still spend your money on MathCad.
What exactly does SMath Studio do?
The application provides a notebook on which you will interactively create your equations. Your equations will look like an engineer or scientist would write them on a whiteboard. And if you enter values for all your variables, you will immediately see the result. The software is especially useful if you have to deal with symbols that your regular calculator doesn’t offer.
The book “SMath for Physics” might interest you if you work in Physics. The book is a primer providing a concise but thorough introduction that keeps physics at a relatively low level so readers can concentrate on understanding the SMath features. The significant features are introduced step by step and focus on using SMath as a simple scratch pad.
Chapter 1, the only free chapter of the book, is an overview of the SMath Suite, and I recommend reading that chapter (you can also download this chapter). It explains the software’s functionality in great detail and provides a lot of additional information that might be of interest.
Here are some of the features (see Wikipedia):
- Solving differential equations
- Graphing functions in two or three dimensions
- Symbolic calculations, including solving systems of equations
- Matrix operations, including determinants
- Finding roots of polynomials and functions
- Symbolic and numeric differentiation of functions
- Numeric integration
- Simple multiline looped programs
- User-defined functions
- Units of measurement
Final thoughts
MathCad is a potent application for solving mathematical problems in a genuinely scientific visual interface. However, it is expensive. SMath Studio, however, is free and almost as powerful as MathCad. It might just be enough for all your needs. So why spend a lot of money?
If you need an app to solve mathematical problems on the go, you might like the Microsoft Math Solver. It is an excellent application for every math enthusiast that also provides graphs and definitions for mathematical concepts.
