Abstract: The poor scalability of existing superscalar processors has been of great concern to the computer engineering community. In particular, the critical-path delays of many components in existing implementations grow quadratically with the issue width and the window size. This patent presents a novel way to reimplement these components and reduce their critical-path delay growth. It then describes an entire processor microarchitecture, called the Ultrascalar processor, that has better critical-path delay growth than existing superscalars. Most of our scalable designs are based on a single circuit, a cyclic segmented parallel prefix (cspp). We observe that processor components typically operate on a wrap-around sequence of instructions, computing some associative property of that sequence. For example, to assign an ALU to the oldest requesting instruction, each instruction in the instruction sequence must be told whether any preceding instructions are requesting an ALU.

Abstract: A wheelchair or a vehicle for sand or loose soil comprises one or more skids, each equipped with a spring-loaded roller or roller plate. Examples of the vehicle include a wheelchair and a planetary rover. Preferably, a beach, shower or pool wheelchair comprises two front skids in place of front wheels. The skids provide a resistance-free, broad footprint in the sand and a low-resistance narrow footprint when used on hard, e.g. boardwalk, surfaces. A wheelchair may further comprise a lightweight, easy to fold frame, which closes like a pair of eyeglasses. Still further, a wheelchair may provide a removable and reclining lounge chair seat to allow the user to exit the wheelchair to enter the water or sit and recline on the sand. In addition, dog bone or dumbbell shaped wheels provide the wheelchair strong, lightweight support and a wide footprint and can be equipped with grip notches for user self-propulsion.

Abstract: A wheelchair or a vehicle for sand or loose soil comprises one or more skids, each equipped with a spring-loaded roller or roller plate. Examples of the vehicle include a wheelchair and a planetary rover. Preferably, a beach, shower or pool wheelchair comprises two front skids in place of front wheels. The skids provide a resistance-free, broad footprint in the sand and a low-resistance narrow footprint when used on hard, e.g. boardwalk, surfaces. A wheelchair may further comprise a lightweight, easy to fold frame, which closes like a pair of eyeglasses. Still further, a wheelchair may provide a removable and reclining lounge chair seat to allow the user to exit the wheelchair to enter the water or sit and recline on the sand. In addition, dog bone or dumbbell shaped wheels provide the wheelchair strong, lightweight support and a wide footprint and can be equipped with grip notches for user self-propulsion.

Abstract: A phase modulated servo method and apparatus provide acceptable position linearity for servo positioning with a narrow transducer head in a disk file. The disk file includes at least one disk mounted for rotation about an axis and the disk has at least one disk surface for storing data and has at least one transducer mounted for movement across the disk surface for writing to and for reading data and servo patterns from the disk surface. The transducer includes a read element and a write element. The read element has a width less than the write element and the read element width is greater than ⅓ of a data cylinder and less than ½ of a data cylinder. A servo pattern is written on the data disk surface having a track pitch of less than ½ of a data cylinder and the servo pattern repeats in a selected binary number of data cylinders.

Abstract: A self servo writing file and method for writing servo patterns in a direct access storage device are provided. First servo information is written on a data storage media at a first crash stop. The transducer heads are moved offset from the written servo information while reading the last written servo information until the detected servo signal equals a predetermined value. Then servo information is written on the data storage media responsive to the detected servo signal equal to the predetermined value. The moving and writing steps are sequentially repeating until a second crash stop is reached. A quad-burst servo amplitude pattern or phase pattern can be used for the servo information. The servo writing method is adapted easily for many different servo options. When the file uses a hybrid servo or sector servo, the other surfaces can be written by duplicating the servo bursts with a high bandwidth servo system of the file.

Abstract: Storing data on a data processing system is done upon generation of a data file by displaying a user interface allowing user selection of storage criteria for the data file. Responsive to user selection of storage criteria for a file determining a physical format type for the file from a plurality of available physical format types. Then the file is stored on a direct access storage device as at least a first record conforming with the determined physical format type.

Abstract: A self servo writing file and method for writing servo patterns in a direct access storage device are provided. First servo information is written on a data storage media at a first crash stop. The transducer heads are moved offset from the written servo information while reading the last written servo information until the detected servo signal equals a predetermined value. Then servo information is written on the data storage media responsive to the detected servo signal equal to the predetermined value. The moving and writing steps are sequentially repeated until a second crash stop is reached. A quad-burst servo amplitude pattern or phase pattern can be used for the servo information. The servo writing method is adapted easily for many different servo options. When the file uses a hybrid servo or sector servo, the other surfaces can be written by duplicating the servo bursts with a high bandwidth servo system of the file.

Abstract: In a disk drive in which a head disk assembly includes a slider suspension member and a parking ramp on which the suspension member rests when the disk drive is not operating, stiction forces between the suspension member and the parking ramp are overcome by applying simultaneously to the suspension member a dither in the form of rocking micromotion, and a bias force to move the suspension member at a low velocity required for loading a slider onto a disk without damage to the slider/disk interface.

Abstract: An apparatus and method for correcting for track misregistration when a slider or head assembly contains a separate read element and write element. The offset is determined at a first position and at a second position of the actuator arm assembly. From these offsets a constant and a multiplier are determined for determining an offset as a function of the cylinder location. Also disclosed is a method and apparatus for minimizing distance traveled to prevent misregistration when repositioning between the read element and a write element. The read element is intentionally offset from the write element at an angle so as to minimize the distance traveled across the disk.