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:
Mar. 23, 2010
Filed:
Mar. 06, 2006
Matthew Blaha, Holmdel, NJ (US);
Patrick J. Quirk, Huntsville, AL (US);
Matthew Blaha, Holmdel, NJ (US);
Patrick J. Quirk, Huntsville, AL (US);
Agere Systems Inc., Allentown, PA (US);
Abstract
In one embodiment, the invention is an apparatus (e.g., an Ethernet switch) having an isolated side and a line side. A line-side connector is connectable to a cable. An isolated-side physical-layer module (1) is electrically coupled to the connector via a signal-isolation transformer and (2) processes signals transmitted over the cable. A line-side power conditioning module (1) is electrically coupled to an isolated-side power switcher via a power-isolation transformer that converts an AC power signal received from the power switcher into a transformed AC power signal and (2) converts the transformed AC power signal into a cable power signal to be supplied via the connector to the cable in order to power a cable-powered device connected to the cable. An isolated-side control module performs a detection function in which the control module determines whether or not a cable-powered device is connected to the cable.