I bought a new calculator at the Dollar Store and, sure enough, it’s defective. After some trial and error with it, I discovered that each digit in the display contained the same two pairs of elements (out of the seven elements labeled A to G below) that were somehow ‘cross-wired’. That is, if one element was called upon to illuminate, its partner would illuminate instead. If both were supposed to illuminate, neither would! For example, if A/D and B/F were the faulty pairs, the number 3 would simply display as F/G/C, as illustrated below.
Based on the illuminated elements for each digit given below, find the faulty pairs to then solve the following 3-digit by 2-digit multiplication:
| C/D | F/B/G/E/C | G/E/C |
X | | F/G/C/D | F/G/E/C/D |
F/E/C/D | F/G/C/D | F/G/E/C/D | F/E/C/D |
(In reply to
re(7): problems with computer program by rod hines)
I didn't use a program because of the uncertainty how digits would be represented. Most calculators I've used, used six elements to represent 6 or 9, so I would have made a mistake, too. Specifying the layout of the digits would have made it a bit easier :-)