2017 AMC 8 Problems/Problem 5

Revision as of 23:52, 4 January 2018 by Max0815 (talk | contribs) (Solution 1)

Problem 5

What is the value of the expression $\frac{1 \cdot 2 \cdot 3 \cdot 4 \cdot 5 \cdot 6 \cdot 7 \cdot 8}{1+2+3+4+5+6+7+8}$?

$\textbf{(A) }1020\qquad\textbf{(B) }1120\qquad\textbf{(C) }1220\qquad\textbf{(D) }2240\qquad\textbf{(E) }3360$

Solution 1

Directly calculating:

We evaluate both the top and bottom: $\frac{40320}{36}$. This simplifies to $\boxed{\textbf{(B)}\ 1120}$.

Solution 2

It is well known that $1 + 2 + \cdots + n = \frac{n(n+1)}{2}$. Therefore, the denominator is equal to $\frac{8 \cdot 9}{2} = 4 \cdot 9 = 2 \cdot 3 \cdot 6$. Now we can cancel the factors of $2$, $3$, and $6$ from both the numerator and denominator, only leaving $8 \cdot 7 \cdot 5 \cdot 4 \cdot 1$. This evaluates to $\boxed{\textbf{(B)}\ 1120}$.

See Also

2017 AMC 8 (ProblemsAnswer KeyResources)
Preceded by
Problem 4
Followed by
Problem 6
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
All AJHSME/AMC 8 Problems and Solutions

The problems on this page are copyrighted by the Mathematical Association of America's American Mathematics Competitions. AMC logo.png