Number formats

[Guest]

I am having trouble with Excel displaying the following numbers:
985.161000874592 - it will not accept and display the last digit (2) of this
number. It will display any other number typed there, just not the number
two. When you type in the number 2 Excel changes it to a 1.

The same occurs with 985.121002873173. In this case the last number (3) is
changed to a 2. Excel will accept any other number here other than 3.

I have read about the 16 digit limitation in Excel, but it is weird that it
will accept and display all last digits in these two numbers except the
numbers 2 and 3.

Any ideas.

By the way, when formatted as text, Excel will display as typed. It's just
that I would prefer these to be formatted as numbers with 12 decimal places.

 

[Guest]

This is not an answer but a partial confirmation ... but on my machine only
the "2" behaves this way - "3" is fine ....

 

[Guest]

Hi,

Excel stores numbers in binary. It accepts numbers to 15 decimal places but
because it is stored as binary the 15th digit may not be correct.

 

[Guest]

Have you tried exponential notation? --- nevermoore

 

[David Biddulph]

Are you saying that you can get 985.121002873173 to appear that way (if so,
in which version of Excel?), or did you just change 2 to 3 in the OP's first
example, in which case your findings agree with what Pat's original message
said.

 

[Guest]

Hi David,

Yeah - Sorry - I never even noticed that the decimal part of the numbers was
different ...