...that when IBM conducted a market study of Chester Carlson's invention in 1959, the company concluded that it would take only 5000 units of his new product to saturate the market? IBM therefore declined to be part of the new product introduction. Too bad for IBM. Carlson's invention was the xerography process, and his new product was the beginning of the Xerox Corporation. It is estimated that every day, worldwide, 3,000,000,000 copies are made!!
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 7369354 | Device for storage of data on data carriers accommodated in cassettes For storage of data on data carriers accommodated in cassettes (28), a device is used with a magazine, having receptacles for cassettes (28) and with a robot unit (44) for changing the cassettes (28) between the receptacles and a drive ( | 05/06/2008 |
| 7350218 | Optical-disk drive and optical-disk ejection control method An optical disk drive comprises a drive body, a spindle motor, an optical pickup device, a sled motor, a tray, a loading motor, and a controller. When the loaded optical disk is ejected, the controller controls the sled motor and the loading motor so that the return... | 03/25/2008 |
| 7340749 | Method and apparatus to detect presence of or a size of a data cartridge A media-detection system for a cartridge-receiving device may comprise, according to one embodiment, a cartridge-referencing member mounted to the cartridge-receiving device. The cartridge-referencing member is resiliently displaceable by a data cartridge received i... | 03/04/2008 |
| 7339858 | Disk device, and methods for checking, ejecting, and loading disk in disk device A disk device includes a disk tray capable of accommodating disks by stacking; a first driving motor for transferring the disk tray in the disk-stacking direction; a driving unit including an optical head for reading out data recorded in the disks, and a supporting ... | 03/04/2008 |
| 7333403 | Carousel changer including a turntable having a plurality of trays A turntable provided in the carousel changer has a plurality of trays provided around its rotating shaft. The turntable is provided with an annular rib including a plurality of recessed portions and a plurality of raised portions. A sensor is provided to have the ri... | 02/19/2008 |
| 7310820 | Recording and reproducing apparatus A recording and reproducing apparatus having a recording medium and cartridge memory inside a cartridge and making a copy of control information memorized in said cartridge memory recorded, in which control information memorized in the cartridge memory is compared w... | 12/18/2007 |
| 7261210 | Shelving system A shelving system including a plurality of movable shelves (1) installed for back-and-forth movement on a travel path through a travel support device, thereby to handle articles with respect to the movable shelves (1) opposed to a working aisle (S) by ... | 08/28/2007 |
| 7261235 | Method for improving security and enhancing information storage capability, the system and apparatus for producing the method, and products produced by the system and apparatus using the method One alternative and optional method of the present invention provides a secured item specific identification system incorporating the steps of identifying an item to a determined degree, generating a first identifying code for the item, generating a second code and ... | 08/28/2007 |
| 7238543 | Methods for marking a bare semiconductor die including applying a tape having energy-markable properties A method used for marking a semiconductor wafer or device. The method and apparatus have particular application to wafers or devices which have been subjected to a thinning process, including backgrinding in particular. The present method comprises reducing the cros... | 07/03/2007 |
| 7219355 | Optical disk reproducing apparatus An optical disk player including: a disk insertion assembly which is positioned on an upper portion of the front face of the player main body and has a disk insertion/ejection opening into which an optical disk is inserted, a disk conveying device which holds the in... | 05/15/2007 |
| 7207481 | Method for improving security and enhancing information storage capability, the system and apparatus for producing the method, and products produced by the system and apparatus using the method One alternative and optional method of the present invention provides a secured item specific identification system incorporating the steps of identifying an item to a determined degree, generating a first identifying code for the item, generating a second code and ... | 04/24/2007 |
| 7145747 | Data cartridge library including a magazine, a picker, an elevator, and a grasper Disclosed is a data cartridge picking apparatus for use with a data cartridge library generally comprising at least one drive, a plurality of data cartridges capable of being disposed in a magazine and a transport system comprising an elevator capable of moving the ... | 12/05/2006 |
| 7094618 | Methods for marking a packaged semiconductor die including applying tape and subsequently marking the tape The present invention provides a method and apparatus for marking a semiconductor wafer or device. The method and apparatus have particular application to wafers or devices which have been subjected to a thinning process, including backgrinding in particular. The pr... | 08/22/2006 |
| 7088644 | Methods for regulating the position of a plunge mechanism of a cartridge engaging assembly Methods for controlling the position of a plunge mechanism which is mounted to a cartridge engaging assembly are disclosed herein. In one method, the position of a plunge mechanism associated with a cartridge engaging assembly is regulated by 1) providing a referenc... | 08/08/2006 |
| 7079346 | Data storage methods and apparatus Methods and apparatus for storing data. An apparatus in accordance with the present invention includes a tape cartridge which has a cartridge memory. The cartridge memory can store therein a set of label data and a cartridge stamp. The set of label data is read by a... | 07/18/2006 |
| 6958963 | System and method for handling events in an optical disc drive A system and method for handling events issued as a result of error conditions in the operation of an optical disc drive include suspending processing of commanded operations in the disc drive while attempting to recover from the error condition. The recovery attemp... | 10/25/2005 |
| 6957440 | Methods for translating and reading optical disks The present disclosure provides apparatus and methods for reading optical disks. Some implementations are particularly well suited for automatically playing both sides of a dual-sided optical disk. By coordinated delivery of disks between a disk reader, a disk trans... | 10/18/2005 |
| 6947356 | Method for selecting a storage medium A method for providing user-friendly selection of a storage medium, in particular an optical storage disk, from a plurality of storage mediums. The storage mediums are assigned to a playback device, in particular a compact disk changer, for reading out and reproduci... | 09/20/2005 |
| 6943976 | Rezeroing a robot accessor of an automated data storage library The positioning of a robot accessor in an automated data storage library is rezeroed with respect to a home position which potentially avoids moving the robot accessor to the home position in every rezero operation. The robot accessor is moved to the expected locati... | 09/13/2005 |
| 6925034 | Apparatus for regulating the position of a plunge mechanism of a cartridge engaging assembly Apparatus for controlling the position of a plunge mechanism which is mounted to a cartridge engaging assembly is disclosed herein. The apparatus may be embodied in a cartridge engaging assembly having a plunge mechanism that is moveable between a retracted position... | 08/02/2005 |
| 6870797 | Media storage system using a transponder for transmitting data signal An apparatus and method for retrieving data related to a data cartridge contained in a media storage system. A transponder (e.g., an RFID transponder) is attached to the data cartridge for storing the related data and a reader attached to a cartridge access device o... | 03/22/2005 |
| 6693858 | Data cartridge detector An apparatus and method for detecting a data cartridge in a cartridge engaging assembly. A signal emitter may be positioned adjacent the cartridge engaging assembly to emit a signal. A signal detector mounted to the cartridge engaging assembly may detect ... | 02/17/2004 |
| 6529453 | Content providing system An information providing system includes a loading section in which a recording medium is removably loaded, a content identification information detecting portion for detecting content identification information of the recording medium loaded in the loadi... | 03/04/2003 |
| 6526004 | Content information vending system An information providing apparatus includes a housing section for housing recording media including a plural kinds of recording media, which have at least any one of plural kinds of contents information recorded in advance. A content detector is also incl... | 02/25/2003 |
| 6038200 | Autochanger An autochanger incorporates a storage unit that includes a plurality of storage sections for storing recording medium cartridges. The recording medium cartridges have a recording medium installed, and a first memory for storing data informative of the rec... | 03/14/2000 |
| 5991245 | Reproducing apparatus for recorded medium A recording medium reproducing apparatus capable of accommodating a plurality of recorded media and exchanging a recorded medium even during the reproduction of another recorded medium, the apparatus being made easy to use. A stocker accommodates a plural... | 11/23/1999 |
| 5933395 | Plugable media stack loading system A media stackloader processes removable data storage media such as optical disks, magnetic diskettes, or tape media. The stackloader removably couples to a storage drive, such as by plugging into a slot of the host computer. The stackloader has a plug por... | 08/03/1999 |
| 5872751 | Library apparatus and a method for assembly thereof A library apparatus having components permitting accurate and straightforward assembly. The library apparatus includes respective cell, drive, accessor and passage units, each having box shaped housings including a connection mechanism. A coupling couples... | 02/16/1999 |
| 5864522 | Auto disc changer In a check mode, a determination is made as to whether or not a disc is stored in each of disc storage positions, and mapping data representing the presence of the discs are recorded into a memory. Disc storage and removal operations are performed based o... | 01/26/1999 |
| 5848033 | Method for searching identification of disk mounting section in optical disk changer system A method for searching an identification of a disk mounting section selectively reproduces a desired disk in an optical disk changer system. In the method, all data for searching the identification is initialized. Whether a present identification is equal... | 12/08/1998 |
| 5768141 | Library apparatus A library apparatus where multiple moving commands generated by several upper-order units are conveyed to a director. The moving commands may be sequentially conveyed through the same channel or may be simultaneously conveyed through different channels. T... | 06/16/1998 |
| 5668790 | Disk reproducing apparatus with plural disk trays A flexible rack member has a substantially V-shaped cam portion formed therein. There is a substantially U-shaped guide slit formed on a wall of a housing. A support bar projected from a reproducing unit is formed so as to fit in a cam portion through the... | 09/16/1997 |
| 5640535 | Library apparatus for duplicating disks and then sorting them to easily distinguish defective disks from normally copied disks A first determination unit determines whether or not the number of storage racks which stores each of a plurality of disks into which informations stored in one copying source disk are copied exceeds the number of the plurality of disks. A copying unit co... | 06/17/1997 |
| 5471445 | Apparatus and method for sensing and holding an item An automated storage and retrieval system includes an accessor device to magnetically hold a stored item while the item is transported within the system. To sense the presence of a magnetically attractable label on the item, the device generates a pulsed ... | 11/28/1995 |
| 5459848 | Library apparatus with access frequency based addressing A library apparatus in which an access part moves a medium to a drive from one of a plurality of cells having a cell address which is specified by a host computer and the drive records/reproduces information-with respect to the medium. The apparatus is pr... | 10/17/1995 |
| 5231616 | Calibration of a cartridge handling device using mechanical sense of touch Disclosed is an optical disk handling system having two control systems to provide the motions necessary to move optical disk cartridges form storage holding cells to an optical drive. During initialization, the cartridge handling system uses shaft encode... | 07/27/1993 |
| 5185727 | Coin or token operated machine for playing pre-recorded record discs There is disclosed a coin or token operated machine for playing pre-recorded discs and which comprises a magazine store (10) for holding a plurality of pre-recorded record discs, with each disc having its own distinctive coding extracted, a selector (11) ... | 02/09/1993 |
| 5164928 | Error recovery in a cartridge handling system Disclosed is an optical disk handling system, called an autochanger, having two control systems to provide the six motions necessary to move optical disk cartridges from storage holding cells to an optical drive. Whenever the mechanisms are being moved, t... | 11/17/1992 |
| 5134600 | Calibration of a cartridge handling device using mechanical sense of touch Disclosed is an optical disk handling system having two control system to provide the motions necessary to move optical disk cartridges from storage holding cells to an optical drive. During initialization, the cartridge handling system uses shaft encoder... | 07/28/1992 |
| 5051973 | Method for playing back music pieces recorded on recording media A method for performing playbacks of pieces of music recorded on recording media, in which a subsequent piece of music to be played back is randomly selected among pieces of music which do not correspond to any playback-inhibition identification numbers n... | 09/24/1991 |