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If we consider a machine that uses 64 bits to represent a number.

If 1 bit is used for sign, "x" bits to represent mantissa and (63-x) to store the (biased) exponent in a manner similar to the IEEE representation.

I'm using this question to check my knowledge of IEEE. Can we say the largest positive number using this machine is: $\left ( 63-x \right )* 2^{2^{x}-1}$

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  • $\begingroup$ You've got a few things wrong in your formula. $\endgroup$ – gnasher729 Jan 20 '18 at 20:21
  • $\begingroup$ The largest positive IEEE number is +Infinite ;-) $\endgroup$ – TEMLIB Jan 20 '18 at 20:36
  • $\begingroup$ According to your formula, the usual double precision numbers can store numbers up to a million billion digits. In reality, it's only about 300 digits. $\endgroup$ – gnasher729 Jan 21 '18 at 19:59

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