The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 06, 2001
Filed:
Jan. 07, 2000
Ian A. Laity, Simi Valley, CA (US);
Gerald Pepper, Thousand Oaks, CA (US);
James G. Hughes, Simi Valley, CA (US);
Donald C. Barrett, Camarillo, CA (US);
Frank McLinn, Simi Valley, CA (US);
Xircom, Inc., Thousand Oaks, CA (US);
Abstract
A PC Card is provided which can be inserted in the PCMCIA slot of a host system either right side up or inverted. The card includes a front portion conforming to the PCMCIA Type II thickness standard and a rear portion conforming to the PCMCIA Type III thickness standard. The card is so configured that two cards can be stacked in complementary fashion and inserted in a host system Type III slot, one card thus being connected to one of the 68-pin slot connectors and the other card being connected to the other 68-pin slot connector. Circuitry is provided for use in an invertible PC Card for electronically detecting the presence, type and orientation of the card, for managing power supply voltages and for directing, or, if the card is inverted, for redirecting the signals appearing at the various pins of the card connector as necessary. Such circuitry comprises an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) incorporating, besides the card function circuits, an orientation detection state machine and a signal mutliplexer.