excel 2007 850*77.1=100000

[Kenchr]

I have found a real odd error in excel 2007 if you multiply 850*77.1 the
result is 10000, if you change it to 77.2 or 77.09 it works fine!?!?!?!?!?

Tell me I am doing something wrong in the formula =A1*B1 where cell A1 = 850
and cell B1 = 77.1

thanks

-k

[JE McGimpsey]

This has been posted just about everywhere, and is the subject of
several threads. Please don't add to another one...

You are doing nothing wrong. It's a bug.

In article <79AB830F-9958-4770...@microsoft.com>,

[Peo Sjoblom]

I doubt you found that, it has already been discussed in another Excel
newsgroup

--

Regards,

Peo Sjoblom

"Kenchr" <Ken...@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:79AB830F-9958-4770...@microsoft.com...

[Kenchr]

Sorry, I searched and I did not see any other posts. Has there benn a
discussion about it? Are there other errors I should know about, or is there
a hotfix?

[Peo Sjoblom]

No hotfix, look in the newsgroup called Excel for a rather large thread
about this

since you are using the web to access it this link might work

http://www.microsoft.com/communities/newsgroups/en-us/default.aspx?dg=microsoft.public.excel&cat=en_US_e064c9ec-14bf-4ef7-ba07-6a1970559f64&lang=en&cr=US

--

Regards,

Peo Sjoblom

"Kenchr" <Ken...@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message

news:4C1E9A5F-39B5-4D23...@microsoft.com...

[James Silverton]

"JE McGimpsey" <jemcg...@mvps.org> wrote in message
news:jemcgimpsey-AA42...@msnews.microsoft.com...

Interesting! I can't say I've seen it before but I don't have
much interest in Excel 2007 as yet. Can anyone tell me when it
was first noticed and has Microsoft done anything about the bug?
Again, as a sometime programmer, has anyone found out the cause
of the feature?

--
James Silverton
Potomac, Maryland

[JE McGimpsey]

Since you posted the exact numbers that have been reported over the last
couple of days, it rather severely strains belief that you independently
came up with that exact combination in such close temporal proximity.

But coincidences do happen, I suppose.

AFAIK, it was first reported 2 days ago and MS has not released a fix.
Nor have they announced a cause.

In article <uHzK1X5$HHA....@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl>,

[Peo Sjoblom]

Hmm? I think that should have been directed to the OP?

--

Regards,

Peo Sjoblom

"JE McGimpsey" <jemcg...@mvps.org> wrote in message

news:jemcgimpsey-59F2...@msnews.microsoft.com...

[JE McGimpsey]

Ah, lost the thread...

Thanks for the correction, and my apology to Mr. Silverton...

In article <u0P2jt5$HHA....@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl>,

[T. Valko]

>MS has not released a fix. Nor have they announced a cause.

They have "finally" acknowledged that there is an issue.

--
Biff
Microsoft Excel MVP

"JE McGimpsey" <jemcg...@mvps.org> wrote in message

news:jemcgimpsey-59F2...@msnews.microsoft.com...

[Kenchr]

Ahh. looks like the user who submitted it to me heard about it from someone
else, I thought it was a valid request, guess I'm still a few days behind in
general :^ )

Anyway there is another thread on slash dot with theories including 16bit/
32bit numbers comparison and it sounds resonable.

-k

[James Silverton]

T. wrote on Tue, 25 Sep 2007 13:51:40 -0400:

??>> MS has not released a fix. Nor have they announced a
??>> cause.

TV> They have "finally" acknowledged that there is an issue.

TV> --
TV> Biff
TV> Microsoft Excel MVP

Anyone remember the "Pentium Bug"? I got a signed letter from
Andrew Grove, promising correction! Quite a change from now.

James Silverton
Potomac, Maryland

E-mail, with obvious alterations:
not.jim.silverton.at.verizon.not

[JE McGimpsey]

In article <#8clLy6$HHA....@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl>,
"James Silverton" <jim.si...@verizon.net> wrote:

> Anyone remember the "Pentium Bug"? I got a signed letter from
> Andrew Grove, promising correction! Quite a change from now.

Given that it's only been a couple of days since it came to public
attention, did you expect Bill Gates to stay up late writing to you?

Gimme a break...

[Jon Peltier]

And I seem to recall that the Pentium reparations were only made under
duress after a boatload of negative publicity.

- Jon
-------
Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP
Tutorials and Custom Solutions
Peltier Technical Services, Inc. - http://PeltierTech.com
_______

"JE McGimpsey" <jemcg...@mvps.org> wrote in message

news:jemcgimpsey-D927...@msnews.microsoft.com...

[James Silverton]

JE wrote on Tue, 25 Sep 2007 15:03:41 -0600:

??>> Anyone remember the "Pentium Bug"? I got a signed letter
??>> from Andrew Grove, promising correction! Quite a change
??>> from now.

JM> Given that it's only been a couple of days since it came to
JM> public attention, did you expect Bill Gates to stay up late
JM> writing to you?

Now that would be a great idea!

[Bob I]

Been only 10 years,
http://www.news.com/2100-1001-205144.html

[Bob I]

Oops, wrong link and bug, correct one;

http://www.trnicely.net/pentbug/pentbug.html

[James Silverton]

JE wrote on Tue, 25 Sep 2007 15:03:41 -0600:

??>> Anyone remember the "Pentium Bug"? I got a signed letter
??>> from Andrew Grove, promising correction! Quite a change
??>> from now.

JM> Given that it's only been a couple of days since it came to
JM> public attention, did you expect Bill Gates to stay up late
JM> writing to you?

As I recall, the date of posting of the error was a question
that asked :-) I never felt that I really got a personal letter
from Andy Grove, signing machines were around at the time and
BIll Gates staying up late or being as embarassed as he should
be is not actually something that grieves me!

[Jerry W. Lewis]

Microsoft recently published a patch that appears to fix this
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/943075
Oddly, this patch (though already out) was not bundled with the "essential"
patches that I downloaded last week along with the trial version of Office
2007.

Values of 2^16-1-d (whether as a formula result or a constant), where d was
too small (2^-37 <= d <= 6*2^-37) to properly impact the 15-digit decimal
representation, displayed as 100000 despite still having the correct
underlying value. Values of 2^16-d displayed as 100001 despite still having
the correct underlying value. Interestingly, this seems to have been a new
intersection in Excel 2007 of two old bugs that have existed at least since
version 4, and probably since the inception of Excel.

1. There appears to have been a set of millions of valid binary numbers
(that included fractional parts) which for whatever reason were not permitted
as constant values in Excel, but were supported as the result of
calculations. The values like this that I am aware of rounded away the
trailing bits in the final three positions of a binary floating point number.
For values like 0.5 +/- d, this rounding made a perverse kind of sense as an
early attempt at the "optimization" that was introduced in 1997
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/78113
which "optimization" has led to numerous questions where a formula that by
itself appears to return zero doesn't behave like zero in a LOOKUP or IF
function or in a larger formula (because at the binary level, the result is
not and should not be zero). This rounding made less sense with numbers
like, 0.5000012207031250266453525910037569701671600341796875+/-d, where even
the "rounded" number could not be fully displayed in 15 decimal digits. This
longstanding bug appears to have been completely fixed in the original
production release of 2007, before application of the current patch.

2. There appears to have been a non-overlapping (AFAIK) set of millions of
decimal fractions that could not be displayed properly
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/161234
admits to x.848 displaying as x.8479999999 for x an integer between 2^15 and
2^16, but there are millions of other decimal fractions that were similarly
mis-displayed
http://groups.google.com/group/microsoft.public.excel.misc/msg/1b2d9f986ce8e65b
I was not previously aware of any number in this set whose incorrect display
was off by more than 1 in the 15th digit; as a result, fixing this bug has
seemed to have little or no priority with MS until now.

I believe both of these longstanding bugs to be related to the current bug
for the following reasons:

- It does not make sense that a current change to the display engine
capable of causing this current bug could have survived its testing phase
without uncovering this bug.

- If the process of displaying results (formulas as well as constants)
first went through the filter of bug 1 before being passed to the display
engine, then the 2007 patch for bug 1, would mean that display of these
impacted values had never been tested, yet the need to test their display
could easily have been overlooked.

- The patch for the current problem appears to also fully patch bug 2,
while preserving the patch for bug 1 (thank you MS for not simply restoring
bug 1).

Jerry