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.

Date of Patent:
May. 30, 2017

Filed:

Mar. 07, 2013
Applicant:

Apple Inc., Cupertino, CA (US);

Inventors:

Henry H. Yang, Los Gatos, CA (US);

Chiajen Lee, Irvine, CA (US);

Shawn Xavier Arnold, San Jose, CA (US);

Assignee:

Apple Inc., Cupertino, CA (US);

Attorneys:
Primary Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
G01R 33/02 (2006.01); G01C 17/28 (2006.01);
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
G01R 33/02 (2013.01); G01C 17/28 (2013.01); G01R 33/0206 (2013.01);
Abstract

Electronic devices may be provided with magnetic sensors for detecting the Earth's magnetic field. The magnetic sensors may include thin magnetic sensors located in magnetically quiet regions of the device. The magnetic sensors may be attached to a device housing or a component such as a battery or a cover structure for a battery. The device may include unidirectional magnetic sensors aligned in three orthogonal directions or sensors with two or three magnetic sensor elements aligned in orthogonal directions. Magnetic field data from the three orthogonally aligned sensors or sensor elements may be combined to form directional compass data for the device. Each magnetic sensor may include one or more magnetic sensor elements for detecting the magnetic field and one or more shielded reference sensor elements for detecting environmental changes that can affect the magnetic sensor element. Reference sensor elements may be shared elements for multiple magnetic sensors elements.


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