I have made a program in Java that calculates powers of two, but it seems very inefficient. For smaller powers (2^4000, say), it does it in less than a second. However, I am looking at calculating 2^43112609, which is one greater than the largest known prime number. With over 12 million digits, it will take a very long time to run. Here's my code so far:

import java.io.*;

public class Power
{
 private static byte x = 2;
 private static int y = 43112609;
 private static byte[] a = {x};
 private static byte[] b = {1};
 private static byte[] product;
 private static int size = 2;
 private static int prev = 1;
 private static int count = 0;
 private static int delay = 0;
 public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException
 {
  File f = new File("number.txt");
  FileOutputStream output = new FileOutputStream(f);
  for (int z = 0; z < y; z++)
  {
   product = new byte[size];
   for (int i = 0; i < a.length; i++)
   {
    for (int j = 0; j < b.length; j++)
    {
     product[i+j] += (byte) (a[i] * b[j]);
     checkPlaceValue(i + j);
    }
   }
   b = product;
   for (int i = product.length - 1; i > product.length - 2; i--)
   {
    if (product[i] != 0)
    {
     size++;
     if (delay >= 500) 
     {
      delay = 0;
      System.out.print(".");
     }
     delay++;
    }
   }
  }
  String str = "";
  for (int i = (product[product.length-1] == 0) ? 
   product.length - 2 : product.length - 1; i >= 0; i--)
  {
   System.out.print(product[i]);
   str += product[i];
  }
  output.write(str.getBytes());
  output.flush();
  output.close();
  System.out.println();
 }

 public static void checkPlaceValue(int placeValue)
 {
  if (product[placeValue] > 9)
  {
   byte remainder = (byte) (product[placeValue] / 10);
   product[placeValue] -= 10 * remainder;
   product[placeValue + 1] += remainder;
   checkPlaceValue(placeValue + 1);
  }
 }  
}

This isn't for a school project or anything; just for the fun of it. Any help

java primes
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