>Frankly I'd not use VFP to do this. I'd write a VC++ chunk of code that would take the 8 bytes and return a float value. I don't even know if VFP supports that particular IEEE standard of floating point value.
PMFJI, but someone did write a C++ solution that took .24 seconds to checksum a 1000x1000 matrix on my machine. I tried running the VB stuff, but it bombed because I didn't have some ActiveX control or another.

I also totally agree with right tool philosophy. Cheers!