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Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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15 Apr 2016, 21:55
5
13
00:00
A
B
C
D
E
Difficulty:
95% (hard)
Question Stats:
60% (01:39) correct 40% (01:37) wrong based on 322 sessions
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Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice, which she has purchased for $17 and $13 per package, respectively. How many packages of corn does she have ?
1. She has $282 worth of packages 2. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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15 Apr 2016, 22:53
2
Vinayprajapati wrote:
Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice, which she has purchased for $17 and $13 per package, respectively. How many packages of corn does she have ?
1. She has $282 worth of packages 2. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice
hi, The Q puts to you a C trap.. the first statement gives you SUM of two variables.. AND the II gives you the ratio of two variables..
and there it is C, BUT more than often the SUM gives you enough INFO to be sufficient..
let the number of packages of corn be C and that of rice be R..
I. 17C + 13R = 282.. check for values of C and see if any integer value of R is possible .. C can take values from 1 to 282/17 = 16..
Only C as 12 and R as 6 is possible.. SUff
II. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice C = 2R.. various answers possible..
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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17 Apr 2016, 00:17
chetan2u wrote:
Vinayprajapati wrote:
Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice, which she has purchased for $17 and $13 per package, respectively. How many packages of corn does she have ?
1. She has $282 worth of packages 2. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice
hi, The Q puts to you a C trap.. the first statement gives you SUM of two variables.. AND the II gives you the ratio of two variables..
and there it is C, BUT more than often the SUM gives you enough INFO to be sufficient..
let the number of packages of corn be C and that of rice be R..
I. 17C + 13R = 282.. check for values of C and see if any integer value of R is possible .. C can take values from 1 to 282/17 = 16..
Only C as 12 and R as 6 is possible.. SUff
II. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice C = 2R.. various answers possible..
A
Hey Chetan I have a doubt in this Question.. I marked the correct answer as i thought in my head that 13 and 17 are prime so the common factor would repeat after 13*17 hence only one value satisfy. Now my question is the process of putting the integers as 1,2,3,4...takes a loooooong time.. Is there any other shorter way to tackle this question . regards S.C.S.A
_________________
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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17 Apr 2016, 00:29
chetan2u wrote:
Vinayprajapati wrote:
Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice, which she has purchased for $17 and $13 per package, respectively. How many packages of corn does she have ?
1. She has $282 worth of packages 2. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice
hi, The Q puts to you a C trap.. the first statement gives you SUM of two variables.. AND the II gives you the ratio of two variables..
and there it is C, BUT more than often the SUM gives you enough INFO to be sufficient..
let the number of packages of corn be C and that of rice be R..
I. 17C + 13R = 282.. check for values of C and see if any integer value of R is possible .. C can take values from 1 to 282/17 = 16..
Only C as 12 and R as 6 is possible.. SUff
II. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice C = 2R.. various answers possible..
A
I have come across a lot of such questions to recognize the trap. But I do not know the mathematical way to conclude that only one combination will fit in. For example, in this case C has to be 12 and R has to be 6. How can we rule out other possibilities? Please suggest. Thank you!
Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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17 Apr 2016, 00:49
2
3
stonecold wrote:
chetan2u wrote:
Vinayprajapati wrote:
Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice, which she has purchased for $17 and $13 per package, respectively. How many packages of corn does she have ?
1. She has $282 worth of packages 2. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice
hi, The Q puts to you a C trap.. the first statement gives you SUM of two variables.. AND the II gives you the ratio of two variables..
and there it is C, BUT more than often the SUM gives you enough INFO to be sufficient..
let the number of packages of corn be C and that of rice be R..
I. 17C + 13R = 282.. check for values of C and see if any integer value of R is possible .. C can take values from 1 to 282/17 = 16..
Only C as 12 and R as 6 is possible.. SUff
II. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice C = 2R.. various answers possible..
A
Hey Chetan I have a doubt in this Question.. I marked the correct answer as i thought in my head that 13 and 17 are prime so the common factor would repeat after 13*17 hence only one value satisfy. Now my question is the process of putting the integers as 1,2,3,4...takes a loooooong time.. Is there any other shorter way to tackle this question . regards S.C.S.A
Is there a shortcut-- it will depend from Q to Q, depending on the properties of the number involved.. Should you depend on a short cut-- MAY BE but do not miss out on other combinations which may as well satisfy the equation...
let me explain through this example-
NOTE- I had initially done the Q by taking values one by one, and you too when you get hang of the tables, would be able to do faster. So when now you have written about a shortcut, I can give you one in this Q..
\(17x+13y=282\) => \(4x+13x+13y=282\).. \(4x+13(x+y) = 282\)... now some info you should gather from here 1) 13(x+y) should form most of 282 as 13>4 and x+y>x... 2) (x+y) should be a multiple of 2 but not of 4--- 3) if entire 282 was formed from 13(x+y), x+y <22 as 13*22>282..
so values of x+y can be 2, 6, 10, 14, 18 only.. Since we are looking for the largest value from 13(x+y), lets try with x+y =18. \(4x+13(x+y)=4x+13*18=4x+234 = 282\)... so \(4x= 282-234=48.. x=12\).. satisfies all conditions written above.. OK x=12, y= 18-12=6
lets try the next possible \(x+y = 14\).. \(4x+13(x+y)=4x+13*14=4x+182 = 282\)... so \(4x= 282-182=100... x=25\).. is it possible that x= 25 and x+y=14, when both x and y are non negative.... NO any number below this 10,8,2 can be ruled out straight way as they would make x much larger than x+y..
so our answer is that ONLY one set of number are possible..
_________________
Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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17 Apr 2016, 13:35
I hate such questions because, as in statement 1, you must be sure that such equation doesn't have unique solution. And with such numbers..How come should i guess about 12 and 6? Picking numbers is time-consuming
_________________
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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17 Apr 2016, 20:12
2
7
Konstantin1983 wrote:
I hate such questions because, as in statement 1, you must be sure that such equation doesn't have unique solution. And with such numbers..How come should i guess about 12 and 6? Picking numbers is time-consuming
This question is based on the concept of "integral solutions". Since in such real world examples, x and y cannot be negative or fractional, usually these equations have a finite number of solutions. After you get one solution, you will quickly know how many solutions the equation has. But getting the first set of values which satisfy the equation requires a little bit of brute force. But the good thing here is that this is a DS question. You don't need to find the actual solution. The only thing you "need" is to establish that there is a single solution only. (Obviously, there has to be a solution since she does own $282 worth of packages.)
Once you understand this, the following will make sense to you.
17x + 13y = 282 If x = 0, y is 21.something (not an integer) If x = 1, y = 20.something If x = 2, y = 19.something If x = 3, x = 17.something
Now you know that there will be only one set of values satisfying this equation. Why? Because x will be less than 17 in the first set of values which satisfy this equation. So if you want to get the next set that satisfies, you will need to subtract it by 17 which will make x negative. So in any case, there will be a unique solution to this equation. Hence statement 1 is sufficient.
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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18 Apr 2016, 20:13
1
One thing I find convenient in these kind of questions is to get help from the other statement that is given as a trap. For example, for this one '(2) She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice' statement should help you pick out the numbers efficiently since you would be choosing twice as as many corn packages as of rice. C = 12 R =6 becomes easy to find
Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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18 Apr 2016, 20:22
1
knuckleduster wrote:
One thing I find convenient in these kind of questions is to get help from the other statement that is given as a trap. For example, for this one '(2) She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice' statement should help you pick out the numbers efficiently since you would be choosing twice as as many corn packages as of rice. C = 12 R =6 becomes easy to find
Hi, it may not be advisable here, unless you are very careful... say 12 and 6 you have found same way.. BUT there is another solution for the EQUATION, then statement I will not be sufficient whereas you will mark it as sufficient.. so you have to ensure that there are no further solutions apart from 12 and 6..
_________________
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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18 Apr 2016, 21:45
1
knuckleduster wrote:
One thing I find convenient in these kind of questions is to get help from the other statement that is given as a trap. For example, for this one '(2) She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice' statement should help you pick out the numbers efficiently since you would be choosing twice as as many corn packages as of rice. C = 12 R =6 becomes easy to find
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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08 Jun 2016, 20:41
thangvietnam wrote:
there is one similar question in og 2015 but it is more easy because we can prove that there is only one set of solution in case of A.
is this problem from gmatprep? i doubt that gmat force us to make too complex accounting
Note that this is a 700+ level question. This concept can be tested in GMAT. If you use some tricks, you can solve the question very easily with few calculations. Check out my discussion on this question above. Also, knuckleduster talks about a strategy that can be used here to solve it very quickly. I have also given a link above where that strategy has been discussed in detail.
_________________
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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08 Jun 2016, 22:28
3
2
Vinayprajapati wrote:
Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice, which she has purchased for $17 and $13 per package, respectively. How many packages of corn does she have ?
1. She has $282 worth of packages 2. She has twice as many packages of corn as of rice
This is an obvious C trap question. If we combine both statements, we will get an answer. So this problem is likely to be solved by one statement only. (With experience you can say that this statement would be A)
If we take factors of 282 we get: 2*3*47.
Statement 1 17c+13r = 282 = 6 * 47. [ where c = corn packages and r = rice packages]
Note that 17 and 13 are co-prime.
Our aim is to find such values of c and r such that 17c+13r = 47.
47 = 34+13. c=2; r=1
We can get a unique answer.
Corn Package = 2*6 = 12 (We dont need to calculate this).
Statement 2
We know that c= 2r. But we dont know exact numbers so not sufficient.
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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23 Sep 2016, 12:36
1
1
17c+13r
1) 17c+13r=282. We can notice that 17 and 13 don't have common factors except 1 => there will be only one (c,r) that will be the answer => Sufficient 2) c=2r doesn't give any help to find out c => insufficient
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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23 Feb 2017, 05:52
Prompt analysis Let the number of package of corn be x and rice be y. Total worth of package is 17x +13y
Superset The value of x and y can be any whole number.
Translation. In order to find x and y, we need: 1# exact value of x and y. 2# two equations to calculate x and y 3# any other constraints to predict the value of x and y.
Statement analysis St 1: 17x +13y =282; x = (282-13y)/17. Sine x and y are whole numbers, therefore, possible value of (x, y) will be (12,6) only. ANSWER
St 2: x = 2y. There are lot many possibility. INSUFFICIENT
Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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24 May 2017, 15:15
1
Solving this one more algebraically. number of corn package = x number of rice package = y
17x + 13y = 282
y = \(\frac{282 -17x}{13}\)
now find the closest multiple of 13 to number 282 which is 286
rearrange the equation
y = \(\frac{286 -4 -13x - 4x}{13}\)
y = \(\frac{286 -13x -4 - 4x}{13}\)
y = 22 - x - \(\frac{4( 1 + x)}{13}\) ............equation 1.
let z = \(\frac{1 + x}{13}\)
writing x in terms of z 13z = 1 + x x = 13z - 1
let's put this x value in equation 1.
y = 22 - 13z + 1 -4z y = 23 - 17z nd x = 13z - 1
let's say z = 1 y = 23 - 17 = 6 x = 13 - 1 = 12
now let's try to see if there can be any other value for z say z = 2 : y = 23 - 34 = -11 ( which is a negative number which can't be accepted) as we increase z y becomes more negative hence no other value of z
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Re: Pam owns an inventory of unopened packages of corn and rice [#permalink]
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27 Aug 2017, 02:37
thangvietnam wrote:
is this from gmatprep.
or from a creative person
?
pls, show the screen with gmatprep simbol
The tag says GMAT Prep. So, most probably it is in fact GMAT Prep. You can check the source of a question in the tags above the first post.
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60% (01:39) correct 
