Patents by Inventor KIRSTY MACDONALD

KIRSTY MACDONALD 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).

  • Power conservation based on hard disk rotational inertia
    Patent number: 8982488
    Abstract: Various embodiments are generally directed recurringly cycling the driving of a platter media of a hard drive with a motor, allowing rotation of the platter media to slow only to a threshold rotational speed to balance power conservation with delays in accessing data. A method comprises driving platter media of a hard drive to rotate at a selected normal rotational speed, retrieving data stored on the platter media when the platter media rotates at the normal rotational speed, ceasing to drive the platter media to rotate to allow the platter media to rotate under rotational inertia imparted to the platter media, monitoring a current rotational speed of the platter media, and resuming driving the platter media to rotate based on the current rotational speed falling to a lower threshold rotational speed selected to be less than the normal rotational speed. Other embodiments are described and claimed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 28, 2012
    Date of Patent: March 17, 2015
    Assignee: Intel Corporation
    Inventors: James P. Kardach, Kirsty MacDonald, Peter Gibson
  • POWER CONSERVATION BASED ON HARD DISK ROTATIONAL INERTIA
    Publication number: 20140185156
    Abstract: Various embodiments are generally directed recurringly cycling the driving of a platter media of a hard drive with a motor, allowing rotation of the platter media to slow only to a threshold rotational speed to balance power conservation with delays in accessing data. A method comprises driving platter media of a hard drive to rotate at a selected normal rotational speed, retrieving data stored on the platter media when the platter media rotates at the normal rotational speed, ceasing to drive the platter media to rotate to allow the platter media to rotate under rotational inertia imparted to the platter media, monitoring a current rotational speed of the platter media, and resuming driving the platter media to rotate based on the current rotational speed falling to a lower threshold rotational speed selected to be less than the normal rotational speed. Other embodiments are described and claimed.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 28, 2012
    Publication date: July 3, 2014
    Inventors: James P. Kardach, KIRSTY MACDONALD, PETER GIBSON