Patents Represented by Attorney, Agent or Law Firm Ronald P. Kananen
  • Patent number: 6707917
    Abstract: A monaural and stereo audio signal control system for use in cable-signal set-top boxes selects signal processing paths as a function of the monaural and stereo nature of the incoming audio component of the television signal and an indication as to whether the audio component is a “clear” or “masked” signal. A clear audio signal is a signal that conforms to a NTSC or BTSC standard that can be processed by a conventional television receiver while a “masked” signal is one in which the carrier frequency has been changed or otherwise modified so that a conventional television receiver cannot extract the audio content. A signal-processing path is provided for conventional clear monaural and stereo audio and for a masked monaural signal and for a masked stereo signal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 9, 1999
    Date of Patent: March 16, 2004
    Assignee: General Instrument Corporation
    Inventors: Henry S. Landgraf, Anthony Troiano, Dipakkumar R. Patel
  • Patent number: 6703777
    Abstract: In an adjusting method for a cathode position of an electron gun, an apex point of a dome-shaped cathode is detected and then a positional adjustment is executed by moving a first grid in a X-Y direction so that a center of a grid aperture is coincided with the position of the apex point, at first. Next, a sleeve ring and a collar portion of a sleeve holder are welded together by a laser beam. The a dgk-vale adjustment is done so as for a gap between first grid and apex point of the cathode to be a predetermined value and welded by irradiating the laser beam to a superposed position of the cathode structure and the sleeve. According to the present invention, these positioning adjustment and the dgk-value adjustment are able to be executed independently.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 21, 2001
    Date of Patent: March 9, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Hirofumi Nakamura, Hideki Miyazaki, Yoshio Fuwa, Hiroshi Ushida
  • Patent number: 6704174
    Abstract: A head substrate and a projection substrate of a head drum comprise a conductive material having a resistance of 1×1010&OHgr; or less and are connected to a metal base so as to be at the ground potential via the metal base and a rotating drum. These antistatic treatments allow static electricity charged on a magnetic tape to be discharged to the head substrate and the protection substrate without flowing to a magneto-resistive (MR) element, thereby preventing the electrostatic discharge breakdown of the MR element.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 13, 2001
    Date of Patent: March 9, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Yutaka Soda, Nobuyuki Nagai, Katsuhiro Kasuga, Hiroshi Meguro, Tadashi Ozue
  • Patent number: 6704550
    Abstract: An antenna switching circuit and communication system capable of reducing a high-order harmonic component radiated from the antenna used for transmission and reception. A fundamental wave passes through a signal transmission line between an antenna switch and a transmitting circuit, a filter circuit is connected for reflecting the high-order harmonic component, the high-order harmonic component generated due to linear distortion of the antenna switch is propagated toward the antenna and the transmitting circuit, the high-order harmonic component is reflected at a node of the filter circuit, and the reflected signal is propagated toward the antenna through the antenna switch. By suitably controlling a reflection characteristic of the filter circuit and a line of the signal transmission line, the high-order harmonic components on the transmission line are cancelled out and the high-order harmonic component from the antenna can be decreased.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 12, 2000
    Date of Patent: March 9, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Kazumasa Kohama, Daisuke Fukui
  • Patent number: 6704788
    Abstract: A method and apparatus for transmitting packetized data objects in a system prone to the loss of individual data cells during transmission reduces the number of times a group of data cells must be re-transmitted. Failed attempts to transmit data cell groups upstream are buffered and individual, successfully transmitted cells are identified. After each failed transmission, all subsequent transmissions are reviewed to determine if, using all the failed transmissions together, a single complete data cell set can be obtained and the data object reassembled. Consequently, the data object is completely received and reassembled more quickly than if a single complete transmission of all cells in the group is required.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 6, 1999
    Date of Patent: March 9, 2004
    Assignee: General Instrument Corporation
    Inventor: William John Garrison
  • Patent number: 6700363
    Abstract: The present invention provides a reference voltage generator capable of operating stably at a low power source voltage, suppressing the increase of a current consumption and providing a stable reference voltage at a high power source voltage, and reducing a layout area. A pMOS transistor, a resistance element, an nMOS transistor, a resistance element and an nMOS transistor are connected in series between a supply line of a power source voltage and a common potential line.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 12, 2002
    Date of Patent: March 2, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventor: Hiroshi Tachimori
  • Patent number: 6700851
    Abstract: A disk cartridge device includes a plurality of disk cartridges with disks having different disk diameters and each being stored in cartridge housings having different sizes, a recording and reproducing device with the plurality of disk cartridges having different sizes selectively mounted, pairs of positioning pins having a base for determining the height for positioning each of the disk cartridges having different sizes onto the recording and reproducing device and positioning holes on one surface of the disk cartridges having different sizes, to be respectively engaged with the pairs of the positioning pins so as to be positioned. The position of the positioning holes of the disk cartridge having a small disk diameter is disposed outside the disk circumference of the disk cartridge having a large disk diameter.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 9, 2000
    Date of Patent: March 2, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Yotaro Sanada, Yoshio Kusui, Naohiro Netsu
  • Patent number: 6698570
    Abstract: An object conveying device is provided that is capable of mounting an conveyed object such as a stamper, to a predetermined position while aligning it without deforming or damaging a conveyed object such as a stamper, a reference pin, and a molding die. This object conveying device includes a coil spring held to a case, an aligning bearing of which the outer ring is held to the coil, and a tray and a conveyed body adsorbing block that are held to the inner ring of the aligning bearing and that hold the stamper. The coil spring and the aligning bearing provide the tray and conveyed body adsorbing block with flexibility to positional variations.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 30, 2002
    Date of Patent: March 2, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Disc Technology Inc.
    Inventor: Kiyoshi Takai
  • Patent number: 6698852
    Abstract: A concave design forming unit with the desired form is formed on the surface of a molded component for use in injection molding using a low melting point metal material. An injection molding cavity of the predetermined shape is formed from a metal mold, and after mold curing the molten metal, the molded goods are removed from the injection molding cavity. The injection molding cavity is formed by a first metal mold unit and a second metal mold unit, the metal mold having a trapezoidal concave design forming unit with the predetermined height formed on the metal mold inside surface of the first metal mold unit or the second metal mold unit forming said injection molding cavity. The metal mold is heated to a predetermined metal mold temperature, and the molten metal heated to the predetermined molten temperature will be injected into the injection molding cavity of the heated metal mold at the predetermined injection rate.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 14, 2001
    Date of Patent: March 2, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventor: Tatsuo Yoshida
  • Patent number: 6700405
    Abstract: A logic circuit capable of suppressing occurrence of wraparound of signals, capable of reducing power consumption, and in addition achieving a reduction of a circuit scale and an improvement of an operating speed and a full adder using the same, wherein provision is made of an exclusive-OR generation circuit 12 for receiving a first logic signal A and a second logic signal B taking a logic “1” or “0” and generating the exclusive-OR of the first logic signal A and the second logic signal B, a dual signal generation circuit 11 for receiving the first logic signal A and the second logic signal B and generating the dual signal of the exclusive-OR of the first logic signal A and the second logic signal B, and an interpolation circuit 13 for compulsorily setting the output level of the dual signal at the level of the logic “1” when the output level of the exclusive-OR is the logic “0”, while compulsorily setting the output level of the exclusive-OR at the level of the
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 1, 2000
    Date of Patent: March 2, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventor: Kouji Hirairi
  • Patent number: 6697317
    Abstract: A disk 1 comprised by a substrate 11, a signal layer 12 made of aluminum in which pits 14 are formed, and a protective plate 13. The information reproducing apparatus emits an electron beam E from an electron gun 40 to the signal layer 12 of the disk 1, detects a change of the incident intensity of the reflection thereof via a detector 42, and reproduces the information of the disk 1 by a reproducing circuit 5. A recording medium 20 comprised by a conductive layer 22, an insulating layer 23, and island-like fixed electrodes 24 thereon electrically insulated from the periphery with a memory function imparted to the fixed electrodes. For the writing, electrons are injected into the fixed electrodes by the electron gun. For full erasure, a voltage is applied to the conductive layer 22. For the reading, the electrostatic effect of the counter electrodes and the fixed electrodes is utilized. This enables an increase of the volume of information and an enhancement of precision of the reading of the information.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 1, 2002
    Date of Patent: February 24, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventor: Yoshiaki Hagiwara
  • Patent number: 6695682
    Abstract: A polishing method executes those serial processes described below: a theoretically ideal amount of removable object is computed; based on the comparison to the profile when actually processing a polishing object via a chemical-mechanical polishing process, a proportional constant k is sought, which is then utilized as a fixed value; a proper polishing time t is computed; the proper polishing time t is then input into a controller in conjunction with other parameters; by way of feeding a control signal CTL1 to an X-axis servo motor, the controller properly controls X-axis directional velocity of a polishing object; the controller also delivers another control signal CTL2 to a main-shaft spindle motor to control the number of its rotation and delivers another control signal CTL3 to a Z-axis servo motor to control Z-axial directional positioning of a processing head.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 13, 2001
    Date of Patent: February 24, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Shuzo Sato, Takashi Suzuki
  • Patent number: 6696351
    Abstract: A process of production of a semiconductor memory device having a memory array including memory cells and a peripheral circuit on one substrate comprising the process of forming an interlayer insulating layer covering the memory array and peripheral circuit; forming the memory cells; exposing a surface of diffusion regions in the peripheral circuit after forming the memory cells; and forming a covering conductive layer on the exposed region of the diffusion regions in peripheral circuit. A semiconductor memory device produced by such a process has memory area having a good data retention due to a low junction leakage in the diffusion regions of the memory cells, whereas it has a high processing speed peripheral circuit due to a low resistance of the diffusion regions of the peripheral circuit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 8, 1998
    Date of Patent: February 24, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventor: Hideaki Kuroda
  • Patent number: 6697222
    Abstract: Disclosed is a tape cassette including a cassette shell in which tape reels around which a tape-like recording medium is wound are contained; a mouth portion provided in a front portion of the cassette shell in such a manner as to be opened forwardly, upwardly, and downwardly, the mouth portion being positioned such that part of the tape-like recording medium crosses the front end of the mouth portion; and a front lid, provided on the cassette shell, for covering the front side of the tape-like recording medium; wherein both side portions of the mouth portion of the cassette shell are taken as tape extraction portions opened forwardly; and each of the inner surfaces of outer side surface front portions of the cassette shell, which forms each of the inner surfaces of outer side walls of the tape extraction portions, is formed into a taper surface which becomes wider outwardly as nearing the front end.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 10, 2001
    Date of Patent: February 24, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Shuichi Ota, Sunao Kushiro
  • Patent number: 6695981
    Abstract: The present invention provides a method for manufacturing a luminescent material whereby the surfaces of phosphor particles are uniformly coated with glass, and a luminescent material made up of such particles is easily obtainable, a luminescent material manufactured by the manufacturing method, and a display substrate and a display apparatus having the luminescent material. The luminescent material is manufactured through the steps of adding a phosphor in the form of a solid solution comprising a sulfide or an oxysulfide, and a luminescent center substance incorporated in the sulfide or the oxysulfide in an aqueous solution containing water glass with stirring; adding the resulting aqueous solution to an aqueous solution of a metallic salt with stirring; forcedly extracting particles of the phosphor from the resulting aqueous solution; and drying the particles of the phosphor extracted.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 13, 2001
    Date of Patent: February 24, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Takahiro Igarashi, Tsuneo Kusunoki, Katsutoshi Ohno, Yasushi Ito
  • Patent number: 6693036
    Abstract: A method for producing a semiconductor device, polishing method, and polishing apparatus, suppressing occurrence of dishing and erosion in a flattening process by polishing of a metal film for constituting an interconnection of a semiconductor device having a multilayer interconnection structure. The production method includes the steps of: forming a passivation film exhibiting an action of inhibiting an electrolytic reaction of a metal at the surface of the metal film; selectively removing the passivation film on a projecting portion so as to expose the projecting portion of the metal film at the surface; removing the exposed projecting portion of the metal film by electrolytic polishing so as to flatten unevenness of the surface of the metal film; and removing the metal film present on an insulation film from the metal film with the flattened surface by electrolytic composite polishing combining electrolytic polishing and mechanical polishing so as to form an interconnection.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 6, 2000
    Date of Patent: February 17, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Takeshi Nogami, Akira Yoshio, Shuzo Sato
  • Patent number: 6694251
    Abstract: The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus including: moving image data storing means for storing moving image data; degree of importance setting means for setting the degree of importance of the moving image data; thinning-out means for thinning out the moving image data on the basis of the degree of importance and, thereby, generating thinned-out data; and transmitting means for transmitting the thinned-out data to another information processing apparatus.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 17, 2002
    Date of Patent: February 17, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Shinji Negishi, Kazunori Yasuda, Yoichi Yagasaki
  • Patent number: 6693258
    Abstract: A polycrystalline thin film of good quality is obtained by improving a crystallization process of a semiconductor thin film using laser light. After conducting a film forming step of forming a non-single crystal semiconductor thin film on a surface of a substrate, an annealing step is conducted by irradiating with laser light to convert the non-single crystal semiconductor thin film to a polycrystalline material. The annealing step is conducted by changing and adjusting the cross sectional shape of the laser light to a prescribed region. The semiconductor thin film is irradiated once or more with a pulse of laser light having an emission time width from upstand to downfall of 50 ns or more and having a constant cross sectional area, so as to convert the semiconductor thin film contained in an irradiated region corresponding to the cross sectional area to a polycrystalline material at a time. At this time, the energy intensity of laser light from upstand to downfall is controlled to apply a desired change.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 4, 2002
    Date of Patent: February 17, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Yukiyasu Sugano, Masahiro Fujino, Michio Mano, Akihiko Asano, Masumitsu Ino, Takenobu Urazono, Makoto Takatoku
  • Patent number: 6693839
    Abstract: A semiconductor memory device which is capable of selectively performing different functions has a chip having a nonvolatile memory capable of rewriting stored data, and a mode switcher disposed on the chip for irreversibly inhibiting data from being written in the nonvolatile memory upon elapse of a preset period of time from a time when a power supply of the semiconductor memory device is turned on if a predetermined signal is not supplied from outside of the chip within the preset period of time.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 12, 2002
    Date of Patent: February 17, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Yoshio Onozuka, Eiji Kawai
  • Patent number: 6693863
    Abstract: To provide an asymmetry correcting circuit capable of canceling an asymmetry simultaneously with quantization in an ADC and utilizing the dynamic range of the ADC effectively, and also to provide an information reproducing apparatus using such a correcting circuit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 16, 2002
    Date of Patent: February 17, 2004
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventors: Norio Shoji, Yuji Gendai, Kimimasa Senba, Nobuyoshi Kobayashi