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| | Define floating point unit - a Whatis.com definition - see also: FPU, math coprocessor, floating-point unit, numeric coprocessor |
 | | A floating point number is a binary number carried out to a specific number of digits, and containing a radix (or decimal) point somewhere in the digit sequence. |
 | | A floating point unit (FPU), also known as a math coprocessor or numeric coprocessor, is a specialized coprocessor that manipulates numbers more quickly than the basic microprocessor circuitry. |
 | | Such numbers are stored in three parts: the sign (either plus or minus), the mantissa (sequence of meaningful digits), and the exponent (power or order of magnititude), which determines the position in the mantissa where the radix point is placed. |
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