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:
Aug. 14, 2001
Filed:
Sep. 30, 1997
Gari L. Cheever, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Kal Krishnan, Fremont, CA (US);
Robert Frankenberg, Alpine, UT (US);
Encanto Networks, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Abstract
A method and apparatus for providing a hot docking interface for transmitting multimedia data. In one embodiment, a hot docking interface is provided on a computer system and a second hot docking interface is provided on a multimedia device. When the hot docking interfaces are placed in contact with each other, multimedia data may automatically be transmitted between the computer system and the multimedia device. The hot docking feature of the hot docking interfaces allows the multimedia device to be placed in contact with the computer system, when the computer system is powered on, and, in response, data is automatically transferred. No cables, wire, or pin sockets are necessary. Moreover, in one embodiment, the hot docking interface of the computer system will provide power to the hot docking interface of the multimedia device to have the multimedia device transfer the data. Moreover, in one embodiment of the present invention, the hot-docking interfaces are configured to enhance the transmission of multimedia data by transmitting the multimedia data in accordance with the IEEE 1394 standard, published in 1995, sometimes referred to as the FireWire™ communication protocol.