Patent Publication Number: US-2006007650-A1

Title: Computer

Description:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS  
      This application claims the benefit under 35 U.S.C. § 119 of Korean Patent Application No. 2004-53512, filed on Jul. 9, 2004, in the Korean Intellectual Property Office, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein in its entirety by reference.  
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
      1. Field of the Invention  
      The present general inventive concept relates to a computer, and more particularly, to a computer having an improved structure of supporting an additional peripheral unit.  
      2. Description of the Related Art  
      As shown in  FIG. 1 , a conventional computer  101  comprises a main frame  103  forming an accommodating space and formed with an opening, and a cover (not shown) opening and closing the opening of the main frame  103 .  
      In the main frame  103  are accommodated hardware components, such as a main board mounted with a central processing unit (CPU), a random access memory (RAM), various expanded cards or the like, a floppy disk drive (FDD), a compact disk (CD)- read only memory (ROM), and a hard disk drive (HDD), which are connected to the main board through cables.  
      Among the hardware components, first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  are electronically connected to the main board, and store data from the CPU. Here, the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  are accommodated in a hard disk drive casing  120 , and mounted to the main frame  103 .  
      The conventional hard disk drive casing  120  is shaped like a box and made of steel material to accommodate the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b.  Generally, the conventional hard disk drive casing  120  has a space large enough to accommodate the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b.    
      The hard disk drive casing  120  has opposite walls formed with a plurality of screw through holes  121  to be coupled with screw holes  111   a  and  111   b  of the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  by screws  108 .  
      Further, the hard disk drive casing  120  has a pair of skirt portions  122  extending from opposite ends and bent outwardly, and each skirt portion  122  is formed with a plurality of mounting holes  123  on a surface thereof to be coupled with mount holes  107  formed on the main frame  103  by screws  109 .  
      With the above-described configuration of the conventional computer  101 , the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  are installed in the main frame  103  as follows.  
      First, the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  are inserted in the hard disk drive casing  120 , and then the screws  108  are fastened into the screw holes  111   a  and  111   b  of the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  via the screw through holes  121  of the hard disk drive casing  120 , so that the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  are accommodated in and supported by the hard disk drive casing  120 .  
      Then, the hard disk drive casing  120  accommodating the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  therein is placed in the main frame  103 , and the screws  109  are fastened into the mount holes  107  via the mounting holes  123  formed on the skirt portions  122  of the hard disk drive casing  120 , so that the hard disk drive casing  120  is installed in the main frame  103 .  
      However, in the conventional computer  101 , when a user wants to additionally mount the second hard disk drive  110   b  into the hard disk driving casing in the state in which only the first hard disk drive  110   a  is mounted to the hard disk drive casing  120 , the hard disk drive casing  120  must first be detached from the main frame  103 . Then, the second hard disk drive  110   b  is laid on the first hard disk drive  110   a , and the second hard disk drive  110   b  is fastened to the hard disk drive casing  120  by the screws  108 . Then, the hard disk drive casing  120  accommodating the first and second hard disk drives  110   a  and  110   b  therein is installed into the main frame  103  again by the screws  109 .  
      As described above, the screws  108  are necessarily used to additionally mount the second hard disk drive  110   b  to the hard disk drive casing  120 , so that the mounting process is complicated. Further, to additionally mount the second hard disk drive  110   b , the hard disk drive casing  120  must be detached from and installed again in the main casing  103 , so that the mounting process is complicated and takes a considerable amount of time.  
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
      Accordingly, the present general inventive concept provides a computer in which an additional peripheral unit is easily mountable to and detachable from a main casing.  
      Additional aspects of the present general inventive concept will be set forth in part in the description which follows and, in part, will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the general inventive concept.  
      The foregoing and/or other aspects of the present general inventive concept are achieved by providing a computer comprising a main casing to accommodate a plurality of hardware components, and further comprising a supporting bracket provided in the main casing and having an entrance opening to accommodate and support a first peripheral unit, and a clip unit coupled to the supporting bracket to cover at least a region of the entrance opening and to contact a second peripheral unit placed above the first peripheral unit in the supporting bracket to resiliently support the second peripheral unit.  
      The clip unit may comprise a resilient supporting portion to contact a top portion of the second peripheral unit at the entrance opening of the supporting bracket to resiliently support the second peripheral unit, and supporting legs extending from opposite sides of the resilient supporting portion and coupled to opposite walls of the supporting bracket, respectively.  
      The opposite walls of the supporting bracket may be formed with holding grooves, and the supporting legs may be formed with holding portions bent therefrom to couple with the holding grooves. 
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
      These and/or other aspects of the present general inventive concept will become apparent and more readily appreciated from the following description of the embodiments, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings of which:  
       FIG. 1  is an exploded perspective view of a conventional computer.  
       FIG. 2  is an exploded perspective view illustrating a computer according to an embodiment of the present general inventive concept;  
       FIG. 3  is a perspective view illustrating a hard disk drive assembly of the computer of  FIG. 2 ;  
       FIG. 4  is a schematic section view illustrating the hard disk drive assembly of  FIG. 3 ;  
       FIG. 5  is an exploded perspective view illustrating the hard disk drive assembly of  FIG. 3 ;  
       FIG. 6  is a perspective view illustrating a first hard disk drive mounted to a supporting bracket according to an embodiment of the present general inventive concept. 
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS  
      Reference will now be made in detail to the embodiments of the present general inventive concept, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings, wherein like reference numerals refer to like elements throughout. The embodiments are described below in order to explain the present general inventive concept while referring to the figures.  
       FIG. 2  illustrates a computer  1  according to an embodiment of the present general inventive concept. Referring to  FIG. 2 , the computer  1  comprises a plurality of hardware components, such as a hard disk drive assembly  10  or the like, a monitor (not shown) to display a picture based on a video signal received from the computer  1 , and an input unit (not shown), such as a keyboard (not shown), a mouse (not shown), etc., to input information to the computer.  
      The computer  1  comprises a main casing  3  forming an accommodating space to accommodate the plurality of hardware components and having an opening and a cover  5  to open/close the opening of the main casing  3 .  
      At a back portion of the main casing  3 , a plurality of insertion holes  7  are formed, and at a front portion of the main casing  3 , auxiliary memories, such as a compact disk drive, a floppy disk drive, etc., are exposed.  
      Inside the main casing  3 , hardware components, such as a main board (not shown) mounted with a CPU, the hard disk drive assembly  10 , etc, and a power supply (not shown) to supply power to the hardware components are mounted.  
      The hard disk drive assembly  10  is electronically connected to the main board and stores data from the CPU, and is mounted at an inside wall of the main casing  3 , as illustrated in  FIG. 2 .  
       FIGS. 3-6  illustrate the hard disk drive assembly  10  of the computer  1 . Referring to  FIGS. 2-6 , the hard disk drive assembly  10  comprises first and second hard disk drives  11  and  12  as first and second peripheral units, respectively, a supporting bracket  20  to accommodate the first and second hard disk drives  11  and  12  and support the first and second hard disk drives  11  and  12  at the inside wall of the main casing  3 , and a clip unit  30  to support the second hard disk drive  12  with respect to the supporting bracket  20 .  
      The second hard disk drive  12  is placed adjacent to or against the first hard disk drive  11  in the supporting bracket  20 . The second hard disk drive  12  is formed with projection grooves  13  ( FIG. 4 ) at a surface thereof to engage with projections  25  of the supporting bracket  20  (to be described later).  
      The supporting bracket  20  has a  -shaped section, and comprises a side opening as an entrance opening, a forward opening, and a backward opening. Further, the supporting bracket  20  forms first and second accommodating spaces  21  and  22 . Here, the supporting bracket  20  is partitioned by supporting flanges  24  into the first and second accommodating spaces  21  and  22 , wherein the supporting flanges  24  protrude in an inward direction from opposite sides of the supporting bracket  20  and partition an inner space of the supporting bracket  20  into the first and second accommodating spaces  21  and  22 .  
      Outer walls of the supporting bracket  20  are formed with holding grooves  23  (see  FIG. 5 ) to couple with the clip unit  30 .  
      Each supporting flange  24  is formed with projections  25  protruding outwardly from a surface thereof to engage with the projection grooves  13 , respectively, of the second hard disk drive  12 .  
      Thus, when the second hard disk drive  12  is placed against the supporting flanges  24 , the projections  25  are inserted into the respective projection grooves  13  of the second hard disk drive  12  and left and right sides of the second hard disk drive  12  are supported by the supporting flanges  24 . That is, the engagement between the projection grooves  13  and the respective projections  25  prevents the second hard disk drive  12  from moving from side to side with respect to the supporting flanges  24 .  
      As illustrated in  FIG. 5 , the clip unit  30  supports a side portion of the second hard disk drive  12  when another side of the second hard disk drive  12  is placed against the supporting flanges  24 , and has an approximately  -shaped section opposite to the supporting bracket  20 .  
      The clip unit  30  comprises a resilient supporting portion  31  to contact a side portion of the second hard disk drive  12  at the entrance opening of the supporting bracket  20 , supporting legs  32  bending from opposite sides of the resilient supporting portion  31  to support a side portion of the second hard disk drive  12 , and a holding portion  33  provided at each supporting leg  32  to couple with the holding grooves  23  of the supporting bracket  20 .  
      The resilient supporting portion  31  can be formed with an approximately rectangular cut out portion  34  in a center portion thereof as illustrated in  FIGS. 3 and 5 , and gradually slopes from outer portions thereof toward the center portion in a same direction as the direction in which the supporting legs  32  bend.  
      As described above, the holding portion  33  of each supporting leg  32  couples with one of the holding grooves  23  of the supporting bracket  20 , and the resilient supporting portion  31  is opened at the cut out portion  34  at the center portion and gradually slopes from the outer portions toward the center portion such that the resilient supporting portion  31  provides a pressing force to a side portion of the second hard disk drive  12 . Thus, the clip unit  30  presses the second hard disk drive  12  and resiliently supports the second hard disk drive  12  with respect to the supporting bracket  20 .  
      With the configuration as described above, a process of additionally mounting the second hard disk drive  12  to the supporting bracket  20  installed in the main casing  3  will be described below.  
      First, as illustrated in  FIG. 6 , the first hard disk drive  11  is accommodated in the first accommodating space  21  of the supporting bracket  20  installed in the main casing  3 , and the clip unit  30  is coupled to the supporting bracket  20 .  
      In this state, when the second hard disk drive  12  is additionally desired to expand the memory of the computer  1 , the clip unit  30  allows the second hard disk drive  12  to be easily mountable into the supporting bracket  20  installed in the main casing  3 .  
      That is, the holding portion  33  of the clip unit  30  is detached from the holding groove  23  of the supporting bracket  20 , and then the second hard disk drive  12  is placed against the supporting flanges  24  of the supporting bracket  20 . Thus, the first hard disk drive  11  is accommodated in the first accommodating space  21  of the supporting bracket  20 , and the second hard disk drive  12  is accommodated in the second accommodated space  22  and disposed adjacent to the first hard disk drive  11 .  
      The projections  25  formed at each supporting flange  24  are inserted into the projection grooves  13  of the second hard disk drive  12 , thereby preventing the second hard disk drive  12  from moving from side to side.  
      Then, in the state in which the resilient supporting portion  31  of the clip unit  30  is in contact with a side portion of the second hard disk drive  12 , the holding portion  33  formed at each supporting leg  31  of the clip unit  30  is inserted into the respective holding groove  23  of the supporting bracket  20  such that the second hard disk drive  12  is completely mounted to the supporting bracket  20 , as illustrated in  FIG. 3 .  
      Here, while the supporting legs  32  are supported at the opposite sides of the supporting bracket  20 , the resilient supporting portion  31  resiliently contacts a side portion of the second hard disk drive  12  such that the resilient supporting portion  31  presses the second hard disk drive  12  and resiliently supports the second hard disk drive  12 .  
      According to the embodiment of the present general inventive concept described above, the second hard disk drive  12  is placed adjacent to the first hard disk drive  11  on the supporting flanges  24  of the supporting bracket  20  installed in the main casing  3 , and then the clip unit  30  is coupled to the supporting bracket  20 , thereby supporting the second hard disk drive  12 .  
      As described above, peripheral units are illustrated as hard disk drives, but the present general inventive concept is not limited thereto. Alternatively, peripheral units may include various other hardware components, such as an optical disk drive (ODD), etc.  
      As described above, the second hard disk drive  12  is formed with the projection grooves  13 , and the supporting flanges  24  are formed with the projections  25 . Alternatively, the second hard disk drive may be formed with the projections, and the supporting flanges may be formed with the projection grooves.  
      As described above, the present general inventive concept provides a computer in which an additional peripheral unit is easily mountable to and detachable from a main casing without taking a considerable amount of time.  
      Although a few embodiments of the present general inventive concept have been shown and described, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that changes may be made in these embodiments without departing from the principles and spirit of the general inventive concept, the scope of which is defined in the appended claims and their equivalents.