Jerry is buying a new large screen television for his game room. He knows that the diagonal of the television measures 42.1 inches and the base is 34.3 inches. What is the area of the television? (round to nearest tenth)

Well a television is a square. so the diagonal will make a right triangle. so we have the base and hypotenuse of a right triangle. We know in rightntriangles that

a^2 + b^2 = c^2

so

a^2 + 34.3^2 = 42.1^2

a^2 = (42.1^2) - (34.3^2)

a = square root ((42.1^2) - (34.3^2))

a = 24.4