Negative Powers of 2

• Binary notation can be extended to cover negative powers of 2, e.g. "110.101" is:

  • 1  22 + 1  21 + 1  2-1 + 1  2-3 = 6.625

• Can represent real numbers by specifying some location in the word as the "binary point"  fixed-point representation.

• In practice, use some bits for an exponent  floating-point representation.

Notes: