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Re: Problem with Solve and NSolve

  • To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
  • Subject: [mg122466] Re: Problem with Solve and NSolve
  • From: Heike Gramberg <heike.gramberg at gmail.com>
  • Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2011 07:11:45 -0400 (EDT)
  • Delivered-to: l-mathgroup@mail-archive0.wolfram.com
  • References: <201110280935.FAA20759@smc.vnet.net>

Solve and NSolve are used to find closed form solutions of equations. 
Since your equation because it is a transcendental equation which 
doesn't have an explicit close form solution Solve returns an error. To 
find numerical approximations of the solutions you can use FindRoot 
instead, e.g.

FindRoot[x^3*Sin[x] == 1, {x, 1}]

output: {x -> 1.04879}

see =
http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/tutorial/SolvingEquations.html 
for more information about solving equations in Mathematica.

Heike.

On 28 Oct 2011, at 11:35, V. Williams wrote:

> I've recently tried Mathematica 8.0.1, and I've found that it's unable 
to compute Solve[x^3*Sin[x]==1,x] (and the same with NSolve), which 
gives an error:
> Solve::nsmet: This system cannot be solved with the methods available to Solve
>
> WolframAlpha solves it without problems, so what's wrong with Mathematica?
>




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