First off, let me say that many of the reviews that compare the present-day models to the original models falsely portray today's 12c as flimsy and ready to fall apart at the slightest brush of a finger.  The fact of the matter is that in spite of the redesign to reduce costs and moves to Malaysia and China, today's 12c is still far sturdier than most other calculators on the market.  The keys, even with painted-on characters, are made of tough plastic and feel rock-solid, which is more than can be said for nearly all other calculators.  Truly, the only recent calculators I consider to be better built are the higher-end Texas Instruments graphing scientific calculators like the TI86 and other renowned HP calculators like the 17BII.