Skip to main content
12 events
when toggle format what by license comment
Dec 19, 2022 at 21:04 comment added Dan Boschen Why the downvote?? I wish people would explain what the issue is when they do that
Dec 18, 2022 at 17:30 comment added Dan Boschen Yes I see! Thank you. Tricky stuff
Dec 18, 2022 at 16:15 comment added robert bristow-johnson $$-2^{N-1} \times -2^{M-1} = +2^{N+M-2}$$ for an $(N+M)$-bit word, the bits will be 01000000000000000000000000000000, There is no redundancy on the left. in order for this to fit in an $(N+M-1)$-bit word the positive result must be less than $2^{N+M-2}$. But it's not.
Dec 18, 2022 at 16:10 comment added robert bristow-johnson not quite, @DanBoschen.
Dec 18, 2022 at 15:54 comment added Dan Boschen yes, I see.... thank you. The exponent is indeed M+N but the maximum positive number we can support is 2^(M+N) -1...which doesn't fit. Got it.
Dec 18, 2022 at 15:50 comment added robert bristow-johnson In all cases, except that single corner case, the two most significant bits of the $N+M$ bit resulting word are identical. For a negative number they are both 11 and for a non-negative number they are both 00. So, except for the corner case, a word size of $N+M-1$ suffices. The one and only exception (let's assume Q31) is $-1.0 \times -1.0 = +1.0$ which doesn't quite fit. in the $N+M$ bit result, the two MSBs are 01.
Dec 18, 2022 at 15:43 comment added Dan Boschen Then I think your corner case would still be M+N-1 bits for multiplying signed values, wouldn't it? Your case given would result in an exponent of N+M-2, but worst case would be (-2^(N-1) x (2^M-1)) with an exponent close to N+M-1...am I missing something?
Dec 18, 2022 at 15:33 comment added robert bristow-johnson yes. i always include the sign bit and "$N$ bits" means the entire word width.
Dec 18, 2022 at 15:31 comment added Dan Boschen When you say a "signed N bit number", are you including the sign bit? So for example, a signed 16 bit number can represent integers from -2^15 to +2^15-1...
Dec 18, 2022 at 1:46 history edited robert bristow-johnson CC BY-SA 4.0
edited body
Dec 18, 2022 at 1:25 history edited robert bristow-johnson CC BY-SA 4.0
added 132 characters in body
Dec 17, 2022 at 23:37 history answered robert bristow-johnson CC BY-SA 4.0