Apple Inc.

Other

Bradley Joseph Hamel

Brett W Degner

Chris A Ligtenberg

Laura M DeForest

Bartley K Andre

Ron Alan Hopkinson

Patrick Kessler

William Francis Leggett

Zheng Gao

John Raff

David H Narajowski

Michelle Rae Goldberg

Kevin M Robinson

John M Brock

Charles A Schwalbach

Matthew Phillip Casebolt

John C Difonzo

Christiaan A Ligtenberg

Gavin J Reid

Kristopher P Laurent

Mikael M Silvanto

Dinesh C Mathew

Keith J Hendren

Erik L Wang

Aidan N Zimmerman

Nicholas Alan Rundle

Christopher J Stringer

Michael D McBroom

Caitlin Elizabeth Kalinowski

John C DiFonzo

Robert L Coish

Eugene J Kim

Euan S Abraham

Jim C Hwang

David John Yeh

Adam T Garelli

Hao Zhu

Stephen Vincent Jayanathan

Paul Joseph Hack

Christoph Matthias Pistor

Joss Nathan Giddings

Richard P Howarth

Markus Peter Diebel

Sung-Ho Tan

Paul Xiaopeng Wang

Tang Yew Tan

Adam Duckworth Mittleman

Daniel Lynn McBroom

Min Chul Kim

Peteris K Augenbergs

Michael E Leclerc

Robert Scritzky

Scott A Myers

Christopher D Prest

Xiang Zhang

Phillip Michael Hobson

Mahmoud R Amini

Storrs Townsend Hoen

Jonah Alexander Harley

Samuel Bruce Weiss

Jason S Sloey

George Tziviskos

Jean-Marc Gery

Ryan P Brooks

Cina Hazegh

Arthur Stanley Brigham

Edward T Sweet

Brandon S Smith

Greg Springer

Gary S Thomason

Matthew C Waldon

Jonathan P Ive

Duncan Robert Kerr

Eugene Antony Whang

Peter N Russell-Clarke

Martha Evans Hankey

Rico L Zorkendorfer

Daniele De Iuliis

Daniel J Coster

Jody R Akana

Matthew Dean Rohrbach

Jeremy D Bataillou

Julian Hoenig

Fletcher R Rothkopf

Hoon Sik Kim

Bryan W Posner

Houtan R Farahani

Robert Y Cao

Alex Joseph Lehmann

Thomas W Wilson, Jr

Jerzy S Guterman

George V Anastas

Simon R Lancaster-Larocque

Simon S Lee

James J Niu

Nathan Nicholas Ng

Simon Regis Louis Lancaster-Larocque

Eric Weijia Wang

Tatsuya Sano

Joel D Barrera

Support systems and stands for electronic devices include tilt hinges, lift arms, and their component parts. Some tilt hinges include assemblies for guiding and retaining bars or protrusions into preferred positioning within receiver openings to unify the parts, particularly as they move, and to reduce wobble or slop in the joints. Lift arms provide simplified and low-cost guidance and counterbalance mechanisms for controlling movement of the electronic device relative to the base of a stand. In some cases, the lift arms have sheaths to help protect or cover mechanisms while allowing additional space for the mechanisms within the lift arm. Other interconnection systems hide and protect a connector interface between the stand and the electronic device within a housing until unlocked and the connector is moved into an exposed position. These systems improve efficiency, comfort, ergonomics, accessibility, and user satisfaction of the electronic devices and their supports.

Reconfigurable stand ecosystem

A foldable display device may have housing portions coupled by a hinge. The hinge may have a series of interconnected links. The links may be formed from interdigitated fingers in a friction clutch. The fingers or other portions of the links may be provided with crescent-shaped slots that receive pins. During folding of the device, the pins may slide along the crescent-shaped slots, thereby ensuring that adjacent links rotate relative to each other about a rotation axis that lies outside of the hinge and within a flexible display panel. Links may also be formed from link members with curved mating bearing surfaces that slide relative to each other as adjacent links are rotated relative to each other. A housing rotation synchronization mechanism may be formed using a set of gears that extends between the first and second housing portions.

Hinges for folding display devices

An input device includes a touch plate having a central axis and a top surface with three outer points evenly spaced away from the central axis. A touch sensor is used to detect a user touch on the top surface at the first outer point, and a support mechanism supports the touch plate and is configured to translate the touch plate at the second and third outer points upon application of the user touch and translation of the touch plate at the first outer point. Translation of the three outer points is substantially equal along the central axis.

Parallel motion trackpad

Connector inserts having reliable contacts, as well as connector receptacles having improved magnetic circuits for use in electronic devices having a thin form factor. These and other examples can provide connector receptacles that can be easily aligned to an opening in an electronic device, as well as connector inserts and connector receptacles that can be readily manufactured.

Magnetic circuit for magnetic connector

Accessory devices for portable electronic devices are described. An exemplary accessory device can include a first segment coupled to a second segment via a first hinge assembly. The accessory can include a third segment coupled to the second segment via a second hinge assembly such that the second segment is positioned between the first and third segments. The accessory device can be arranged between a closed configuration and a configuration of a stand that supports the portable electronic device at a viewing angle. At the support configuration, the second segment can be at an acute angle relative to the first segment to shift the center of gravity of the system towards the middle. The third segment can be suspended above the first segment and be inclined outwards. The hinge assemblies of the system can be sufficiently stiff to withstand the weight of the electronic device.

Accessories for portable electronic devices

Display assemblies for supporting displays on stands or support arms have mount portions to removably attach to the displays using magnetic assemblies and latches. The magnetic assemblies and latches can improve user experience and allow the display to be installed on a support arm from the viewing side of the display and without having to see or reach behind the display. Magnetic structures can center a mount portion of the support arm and a recess of the display and can attract them to each other. Laterally-extending latches can ensure the display is not inadvertently removed. Locking mechanisms can prevent the display from being rotated to a portrait orientation when sufficient space around the display and the necessary user intent is not provided.

Display support arm mount

Connectors that have a low profile, can form strong and reliable connections despite connection alignment errors, and can be readily manufactured. One example can provide a connector receptacle having a magnetic array arranged to provide a strong attachment that allows the use of a low profile connector receptacle and connector insert. The magnetic array can include magnets and magnetic elements, where the magnetic elements can be magnetically conductive pole-pieces. Each pole piece can have magnets at two of its sides. Another example can provide contacts for a connector insert that can have more than one contacting surface to connect to a contact of a connector receptacle.

Magnetic connectors with self-centering floating contacts

A system may include a finger device that is worn on a user's finger. The finger device may serve as a controller for a head-mounted device or other devices in the system. The finger device may have a foldable housing with hinge structures that allow portions of the housing to fold with respect to each other. Magnets or other bistability structures may be used to provide the folding housing with folding bistability. This allows the housing to be placed in a stable unfolded state that releases the finger or a stable folded state in which the housing snaps over the finger and holds the finger device in place. A base may be used to store the finger device for charging. The base may have deployment structures that help place the finger device on the user's finger for use.

Deployment systems for computer system finger devices

An electronic device may have a fiber composite friction hinge with first and second members that rotate relative to each other about a hinge axis. The fiber composite hinge may have first and second sets of interdigitated elongated fingers. Holes in the elongated fingers may receive a shaft of a fastener. The fastener may be tightened to squeeze the elongated fingers together along the hinge axis. The fiber composite hinge may be formed from a fiber composite material such as carbon fiber composite material. Fibers in the composite material may be embedded in binder such as polymer binder. The fibers may wrap around the holes and fold back on themselves in the fingers. Actuators may be provided to adjust the positions of portions of the hinge members. The electronic device may have a flexible layer such as a flexible display that overlaps the hinge structure.

Electronic devices with fiber composite friction hinges

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Sunnyvale, CA, United States of America

Bradley Joseph Hamel