Patents by Inventor Douglas Beard

Douglas Beard has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 7539476
    Abstract: An improved receiver architecture and method for a wireless transceiver (e.g. for a headphone) is provided whereby the receiver, advantageously, enables the use of only one synthesizer circuit for both the RF-to-IF and IF-to-base band conversion processes which, in turn, provides for lower power consumption. The receiver includes an injection locked local receiver oscillator (Rx LO) which is used for the first mixing stage (i.e. the RF-to-IF conversion). The Rx LO 105 is thereby able to use a high-level harmonic of a relatively low reference frequency signal produced by that synthesizer (e.g. a fractional-N phase locked loop circuit (PLL)). The receiver further includes a tunable Q-enhanced IF filter 110 and complex sub-sampling and mixing down-conversion circuitry for the second conversion stage (i.e. IF-to-baseband conversion). The sampling frequency used for the second conversion stage is a harmonic of the reference frequency derived from the synthesizer (PLL).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 13, 2006
    Date of Patent: May 26, 2009
    Assignee: Kleer Semiconductor Corporation
    Inventors: Christopher Andrew Devries, Ralph Dickson Mason, Ronald Douglas Beards
  • Patent number: 7529976
    Abstract: To log errors of a plurality of subsystems, a master reporting tool provides a table identifying the subsystems and their interface protocol addresses with respect to a network. A subsystem reports errors, via the network, to the master reporting tool, and the reporting subsystem identifies and reports other subsystems associated with the errors, if any, to the master reporting tool. The master reporting tool employs the interface addresses of the table to request reportable data from the other subsystems identified by the originally reporting subsystem as associated with the reported error. The network may be separate from a data handling network of the data handling system.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 20, 2006
    Date of Patent: May 5, 2009
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Jonathan Douglas Beard, Louis Daniel Echevarria, Andrew Gary Hourselt, Robin Daniel Roberts, Kerri Renee Shotwell
  • Publication number: 20070294604
    Abstract: To log errors of a plurality of subsystems, a master reporting tool provides a table identifying the subsystems and their interface protocol addresses with respect to a network. A subsystem reports errors, via the network, to the master reporting tool, and the reporting subsystem identifies and reports other subsystems associated with the errors, if any, to the master reporting tool. The master reporting tool employs the interface addresses of the table to request reportable data from the other subsystems identified by the originally reporting subsystem as associated with the reported error. The network may be separate from a data handling network of the data handling system.
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 20, 2006
    Publication date: December 20, 2007
    Inventors: Jonathan Douglas Beard, Louis Daniel Echevarria, Andrew Gary Hourselt, Robin Daniel Roberts, Kerri Renee Shotwell
  • Patent number: 7302570
    Abstract: An apparatus, system, and method are provided for authorized remote access to a target system. The apparatus, system, and method include a security module and an authorization module that cooperate to authenticate a remote user using three passwords. The apparatus, system, and method selectively generate an encrypted key in response to a first password. The authorization module decrypts the encrypted key and determines a third password in response to authenticating a second password and identifying a remote user within an authorized user list. The third password is then used to gain secure, traceable, and in certain embodiments, restricted remote access to a target system.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 19, 2003
    Date of Patent: November 27, 2007
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Jonathan Douglas Beard, Craig Frederick Schultz, Douglas Wallace Todd
  • Publication number: 20050081113
    Abstract: By providing at least two hardware representations of a specified circuit design, an efficient debugging system is provided that allows 100% design visibility at an extremely reduced simulation time owing to a time-shifted operation of the at least two hardware representations. Upon detection of a specified abort state in the leading hardware representation, the corresponding delayed state of the time-shifted hardware representation may be used for a subsequent simulation of only a relevant portion of the test run that has lead to the specified abort state.
    Type: Application
    Filed: June 1, 2004
    Publication date: April 14, 2005
    Inventors: Douglas Beard, Holger Eisenreich, Kai Eichhorn
  • Patent number: 6711396
    Abstract: A method and system for reducing local oscillator leakage from radio frequency mixers is disclosed. Compensating circuits are used to reduce or eliminate unwanted leakage from the mixer output signal by controlling the current in individual branches of a balanced input circuit of the mixer. The current is directly controlled by adjusting the voltage on the bases of the differential type amplifier input transistors, or by injecting current directly into the individual branches, or by extracting current directly from the individual branches. The current is also indirectly controlled by increasing the temperature of the mixer components with power dissipation elements that are not connected to the mixer. The compensating circuits are made of different combinations of resistor, transistor and current sink components.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 13, 2000
    Date of Patent: March 23, 2004
    Assignee: Nortel Networks Limited
    Inventors: Adrian J. Bergsma, Ronald Douglas Beards, John Jackson Nisbet, Theodore Gregory Carron
  • Patent number: 6417712
    Abstract: Sine and cosine weighting functions are applied to phase quadrature versions of an input signal to be phase shifted, and the weighted results are summed to provide a phase shifted output signal with an amplitude which is relatively independent of the phase shift. A weighting circuit comprises two translinear sine shaping circuits having differential current outputs providing weighting signals from input currents supplied thereto, the input currents of the two sine shaping circuits being offset relative to one another so that the differential current outputs of the two sine shaping circuits are provided in accordance with a sine function and a cosine function, respectively, of a control signal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 27, 2000
    Date of Patent: July 9, 2002
    Assignee: Nortel Networks Limited
    Inventors: R. Douglas Beards, John J. Nisbet, Qi Tang, Eric Gagnon
  • Patent number: 5920235
    Abstract: A voltage controlled oscillator has a cross-coupled negative resistance cell formed as an integrated circuit connected to off-chip components of a high-Q resonant tank circuit. To counteract spurious oscillations brought about by package parasitics caused by the interconnection of the chip to the external components, the cell is provided with a degeneration impedance. Typically, a pure inductor is used if all the elements of the tank circuit are off-chip. In a case where the tank circuit includes an on-chip fixed capacitor, the degeneration impedance may take the form of a capacitor.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 25, 1997
    Date of Patent: July 6, 1999
    Assignee: Northern Telecom Limited
    Inventors: Ronald Douglas Beards, Samuel Alfred Tiller
  • Patent number: 5752274
    Abstract: An address translation unit is disclosed employing a direct-mapped translation lookaside buffer and a relatively small, associative victim translation lookaside buffer for translating linear addresses to physical addresses expediently and avoiding thrashing, without requiring large amounts of hardware and space.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 8, 1994
    Date of Patent: May 12, 1998
    Assignee: Cyrix Corporation
    Inventors: Raul A. Garibay, Jr., Marc A. Quattromani, Douglas Beard