Electrical connectors – Preformed panel circuit arrangement – e.g. – pcb – icm – dip,... – With provision to conduct electricity from panel circuit to...
Reexamination Certificate
2001-12-13
2003-04-15
Bradley, P. Austin (Department: 2833)
Electrical connectors
Preformed panel circuit arrangement, e.g., pcb, icm, dip,...
With provision to conduct electricity from panel circuit to...
C439S075000, C439S148000, C439S528000, C439S924100
Reexamination Certificate
active
06547569
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
PC/
104
is a de facto standard (IEEE P996.1 standard for Compact Embedded-PCModules) which has a compact form-factor (size 3.6 by 3.8 inches) and a unique self-stacking bus which eliminates the cost and bulk of back planes and card cages. The PC/
104
cards use pin-and-socket connectors that are rugged and reliable. The electrical bus is a relaxed bus drive (6 mA) which lowers power consumption (to 1-2 Watts per module) and minimizes component count.
FIG. 1
depicts a module stack of PC/
104
cards. The distance between cards
10
a-d
is precisely controlled by the use of spacers
12
. The details of the connector are depicted in detail in
FIGS. 2A and B
. In
FIGS. 2A and B
, stackthrough cards use passthrough connectors having male and female parts. A female connector assembly
16
is included on each card
10
.
Conventional electrical connector assemblies include complementary male and female connectors for establishing electrical connections between electrical systems and components. The standard PC/
104
connectors on a designated card are designed to supply signals to components on the designated card and also to pass signals between cards stacked below the designated card and cards stacked above the designated card.
The pins of the PC/
104
connectors are assigned to signals of the ISA bus. Thus, all signals generated by components on a PC/
104
card that are transmitted via pins on the PC/
104
connector must comply with the ISA specification for the signal carried by that pin.
The PC/
104
standard has been extended by the PC/
104
-Plus standard which incorporates all the features of PC/
104
but also includes an additional connector that supports the PCI bus. In the following, for convenience, reference-to PC/
104
is to be understood to include reference to the PC/
104
-Plus.
Referring to
FIGS. 2A and B
, to accomplish the pass-through function, the connectors include a female connector assembly
16
having an array of pin slots
18
formed therein. The pins
28
include an elongated male connector portion
30
, a head
31
, and a female connector portion
32
. There are various pin configurations used in the industry. In one type of connector, the female connector portion
32
is in the form of a clip attached to the head of the pin. The clip can include tabs
33
that recess into a notch formed in the pin slot. When the pin is inserted into the slot the tab engages the notch to precisely control the depth of insertion of the pin into the bottom of the pin slot
18
. The female connector assembly
16
is mounted on the major surface of a first card
10
a
. A first set of pins
34
have their heads inserted into the female connector assembly
16
mounted on the first card
10
a
and pass through plated holes in the card which are connected to electrical traces on the card that transmit signals to components on the card.
A second set of pins
36
are inserted into the female connector assembly
16
of a second card
10
b
stacked above the first card. The spacers
12
for stacking the cards, the length of the pins, and the precisely controlled insertion depth of the female connectors are designed so that the male connector portions
30
of the second set of pins
36
are aligned with pin slots and so that the ends of the male connector portions
30
of the second set of pins
36
are inserted a precise distance into the pin slot and engage the female connector portions
32
of the first set of pins
34
to establish an electrical connection to conduct the signals to the components on the second card.
Companies embedding PC technology, having applications where space is limiting, can now benefit from a standardized system architecture complete with a wide range of multi-vendor support. For PC/
104
modules that require I/O interconnect of signals not defined for PC/
104
or PC/
104
-Plus connector buses various techniques are utilized.
One technique is to use custom I/O connectors that are typically designed by vendors to interconnect I/O signals between modules from the same vendors. Depending on the number of interconnecting I/O signals required and the density of each board, the I/O custom connectors can quickly become an a problem because board space is valuable in a compact architecture design.
Another technique is to transform the non-standard signal to a bus signal, transmits the converted signal to the next card using the connector, and then transform the bus signal back to the not-standard signal. The problem with this technique is that extra components for transforming the signals are required which adds to the complexity and cost of the system.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
According to one aspect of the invention, these problems are solved by re-using the PC/
104
connector pins for non-bus I/O signals between modules without interfering with the PC/
104
electrical bus specifications.
According to another aspect of the invention, for certain PC/
104
modules designs that do not necessarily use the entire pin count on the PC/
104
connector, the unused pins on the PC/
104
are used to route required extra I/O signals in between these modules.
According to another aspect of the invention, in order not to interfere with PC/
104
electrical connecting bus, these identified pins that are design specific, can be made to connect the two or more modules together, while keeping electrical isolation from the originally designated pins stated by the PC/
104
spec.
According to another aspect of the invention, one of the modules is the “bottom module” i.e. non-stacking, while the next module stacked above it, is the module to which the I/O signals need to route to. To isolate the I/O signals from the main PC/
104
bus, the upper module connector provides the isolation. The isolation mechanism is achieved by recessing the metal connector within the pins socket, and partially plugging the hole itself This mechanism eliminates any interference with the PC/
104
bus stack up modules, while allowing unused pins to be used for routing channels within the PC/
104
connector.
Other features and advantages of the invention will be apparent in view of the following detailed description and appended figures.
REFERENCES:
patent: 4891017 (1990-01-01), Kuhn et al.
patent: 5176528 (1993-01-01), Fry et al.
patent: 5613864 (1997-03-01), Northey
patent: 5704796 (1998-01-01), Swenson
patent: 6193529 (2001-02-01), Kimura
PC/104-Plus Specification, Version 1.0, Feb. 1997, PCI Special Interest Group, P.O. Box 14070, Portland, OR 97214.
Bradley P. Austin
Cisco Technology Inc.
Krueger Charles E.
Nguyen Truc
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