Patent Publication Number: US-2009219683-A1

Title: Notebook computer

Description:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 
     This application is based upon and claims the benefit of priority from Japanese Patent Application No. 2008-052451, filed Mar. 3, 2008, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference. 
     BACKGROUND 
     1. Field 
     One embodiment of the present invention relates to a notebook computer having excellent portability. 
     2. Description of the Related Art 
     A personal computer disclosed in, e.g., Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2003-91342 includes an FM tuner and a DVD drive. This personal computer has a function of recording, e.g., audio data input from the FM tuner on a DVD. 
     To attach an FM antenna to the personal computer, for example, the antenna cable is stationarily led over the walls of a room. 
     Such a stationary antenna cable may accidentally be caught by an object so that it may be broken, or its connection portion may be damaged. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS 
       A general architecture that implements the various feature of the invention will now be described with reference to the drawings. The drawings and the associated descriptions are provided to illustrate embodiments of the invention and not to limit the scope of the invention. 
         FIG. 1  is a perspective view showing the outer appearance of a notebook computer according to the embodiment of the present invention; 
         FIG. 2  is a perspective view showing the outer appearance of a rod antenna to be attached to the notebook computer shown in  FIG. 1 ; 
         FIG. 3  is a schematic view showing a state in which the rod antenna is attached to a side surface of the notebook computer; 
         FIG. 4  is a schematic view showing a circuit board incorporated in the device main body of the notebook computer and a part of the rod antenna; 
         FIG. 5  is a view showing an example of an FM tuner operation window displayed via the display unit of the notebook computer; and 
         FIG. 6  is a flowchart for explaining a method of operating the operation window in  FIG. 5 . 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
     Various embodiments according to the invention will be described hereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings. In general, according to one embodiment of the invention, a pin jack  2  to receive a rod antenna  1  is provided on a side surface  14   b  of a device main body  12  of a notebook computer  10 . The rod antenna  1  has a pin plug  8  to be inserted in the pin jack  2  and is rotatable when attached to the device main body  12 . 
     According to an embodiment,  FIG. 1  shows the notebook computer  10 .  FIG. 2  shows the rod antenna  1  attachable to the side surface  14   b  of the notebook computer  10 . 
     As shown in  FIG. 1 , the notebook computer  10  includes the device main body  12 , and a display unit  13  (display panel) supported by the device main body  12 . The device main body  12  has a case  14 . The case  14  is formed into a flat box shape including an almost rectangular base  15  and an almost rectangular cover  16  fitted in the base. The external walls of the case  14  include an outer surface  14   a  and the side surfaces  14   b , which are exposed externally. 
     The side surface  14   b  of the case  14  has the pin jack  2  to receive the rod antenna  1  shown in  FIG. 2  as well as an earphone jack  4  and a microphone jack  6 . The pin jack  2  has a diameter larger than that of the earphone jack  4  or microphone jack  6  to prevent the user from erroneously attaching the pin plug  8  of the rod antenna  1  to the earphone jack  4  or microphone jack  6 . 
     In other words, the pin plug  8  of the rod antenna  1  also has a larger diameter to prevent the user from erroneously attaching it to the earphone jack  4  or microphone jack  6 . In this embodiment, the diameter of the earphone jack  4  and the microphone jack  6  is 3.5 mm, whereas the diameter of the pin jack  2  is 4 mm. 
     The cover  16  has an almost rectangular opening  19  from the central portion toward the rear potion. A keyboard  20  is exposed in the opening  19 . Almost the front half portion of the cover  16  forms a palm rest  22 . The palm rest  22  has, at its center, an operation region  50  and click switches  42  to operate a pointing device. That is, the user places the palms on the palm rest  22  and operates the pointing device or performs input operations via the keyboard  20 . 
     A pair of loudspeakers  24  are provided at the rear end of the cover  16 . A plurality of operation button indicators  26  are provided between the loudspeakers. 
     The cover  16  has, at its rear end, a pair of hinge portions  28  spaced part in the widthwise direction of the case  14 . 
     X The display unit  13  includes a display housing  30  and a liquid crystal panel  32  accommodated in the display housing  30 . A window portion  31  for display is formed in the front wall of the display housing  30 . The window portion  31  has almost the same size as the front wall. The display screen of the liquid crystal panel  32  is exposed outside the display housing  30  via the window portion  31 . 
     The display housing  30  has a pair of concave connector portions  33  at one end. The concave connector portions  33  are spaced part in the widthwise direction of the display housing  30  and engaged with the pin portions  28  of the case  14 . The display housing  30  is supported by hinges (not shown) provided on the concave connector portions  33  and the pin portions  28  to freely pivot with respect to the case  14 . 
     Hence, the display unit  13  can pivot between a close position where the display unit falls and covers the upper surface of the case  14  including the palm rest  22  and the keyboard  20  and an open position where the display unit stands up to expose the upper surface of the case and the liquid crystal panel  32 . 
       FIG. 1  shows the notebook computer  10  whose display unit  13  has pivoted to the open portion. In  FIG. 1 , the rod antenna  1  is detached from the pin jack  2 . 
     As shown in  FIG. 2 , the rod antenna  1  has the pin plug  8  to be inserted in the pin jack  2  provided on the side surface  14   b  of the case  14 . The rod antenna  1  also has an antenna main body  9  made of a flexibly bendable resin material. In this embodiment, the pin jack  2  is located near the palm rest  22 . For this reason, the user&#39;s hand accidentally touches the antenna main body  9  at a high possibility. However, the flexibly bendable antenna main body  9  prevents the hand that has touched it from breaking the antenna main body  9  or the pin plug  8 . 
     When the rod antenna  1  is attached to the device main body  12  by inserting the pin plug  8  in the pin jack  2  of the case  14 , the long antenna main body  9  stands up from the side surface  14   b  of the device main body  12 , as shown in the schematic view of  FIG. 3 . More specifically, the pin plug  8  and the antenna main body  9  have axes perpendicular to each other. The antenna main body  9  can pivot about the axis of the pin plug  8  (i.e. the axis of the pin jack  2 ). That is, the pin plug  8  functions as the rotating shaft of the rod antenna  1  in this embodiment. It is therefore possible to rotate the rod antenna  1  to a posture with a high reception sensitivity. 
     As shown in  FIGS. 3 and 4 , the case  14  of the device main body  12  incorporates a circuit board  11 . The circuit board  11  is screwed to the bottom plate of the base  15  of the case  14 .  FIG. 3  is a schematic view showing a state in which the rod antenna  1  is attached to the notebook computer  10 .  FIG. 4  is a schematic plan view of the circuit board  11 . 
     A child board  60  having an FM tuner module  62  is attached to the circuit board  11 . A connector  64  for connecting the FM tuner module  62  to the pin jack  2  and a connector  66  on the signal output side of the FM tuner module  62  are attached to the child board  60 . The child board  60  is detachable from the circuit board  11  in accordance with a user&#39;s request. 
       FIG. 5  shows an example 70 of an FM tuner operation window (to be simply referred to as the operation window  70  hereinafter) which displays the operation state of the FM tuner module  62  and various operation buttons of the FM tuner module  62 .  FIG. 6  is a flowchart for explaining a method of operating the FM tuner using the operation window  70 . The FM tuner operation method will be described below with reference to  FIGS. 5 and 6 . 
     The operation window  70  shown in  FIG. 5  is displayed via the liquid crystal panel  32  of the display unit  13 . The operation window  70  displays a graph  80  that shows the reception levels of signals received via the rod antenna  1  for the respective frequencies. The operation window  70  also displays a power-on button  71 , power-off button  72 , search button  73 , threshold setting buttons  74 , seek button  75 , volume down button  76 , volume up button  77 , and volume control button  78  in addition to the graph  80 . 
     The graph  80  includes a vertical line  82  indicating the current listening target frequency, and a horizontal line  84  indicating the threshold of the signal level. The user can move the horizontal line  84  indicating the threshold up and down using the threshold setting buttons  74 . More specifically, the settable threshold can be changed in four steps. 
     As shown in  FIG. 6 , when the power-on button  71  is pressed (step S 1 ), and the search button  73  is pressed, signals receivable via the rod antenna  1  are scanned, and the levels of the received signals of the respective frequencies are displayed in the graph  80  (step S 2 ). In this state, the user can rotate the rod antenna  1  to an optimum rotation position where the signal level is high. At this time, the signal level can be determined based on the graph  80 . 
     After that, a desired signal level threshold is set (step S 3 ). The user presses one of the four threshold setting buttons  74  to set a level threshold of his/her desire. The set threshold is indicated by the horizontal line  84  that moves on the graph  80 . 
     For example, when the user lowers the threshold and presses the seek button  75 , many frequencies having signal levels greater than the threshold are detected. When the user raises the threshold, the number of frequencies having signal levels greater than the threshold decreases. In this embodiment, one of the four thresholds is selected. However, the user may arbitrarily set the threshold. 
     When the user sets the threshold in step S 3  and presses the seek button  75 , signals having levels greater than the set threshold are sequentially sought (step S 4 ). At this time, the vertical line  82  moves on the graph  80  from the left end to the right end in  FIG. 5 . For example, when the signal of the desired frequency is detected, the user presses the seek button  75  again to fix the frequency of the signal. 
     Sound of the FM tuner is output from the loudspeakers  24 . The user can adjust the volume by pressing the volume down button  76  or volume up button  77  or by moving the volume control button  78  using a pointer (not shown). 
     As described above, according to this embodiment, the rod antenna  1  is detachable from the notebook computer  10 . It is therefore possible to prevent the rod antenna  1  from being caught by an object and increase the portability in carrying the notebook computer  10 . 
     Additionally, since the rod antenna  1  is detachable, it is unnecessary to arrange an antenna for FM reception in the case  14  of the device main body  12 . Hence, no space for implementing an antenna is required in the case  14 , and layout design becomes easy. 
     Furthermore, since the rod antenna  1  can be attached by inserting its pin plug  8  of the rod antenna  1  in the pin jack  2 , the user can rotate the rod antenna  1  at its attachment portion and adjust the angle of the rod antenna  1 . This allows to adjust the reception sensitivity of FM broadcasting in accordance with the installation location of the notebook computer  10 . 
     While certain embodiments of the inventions have been described, these embodiments have been presented by way of example only, and are not intended to limit the scope of the inventions. Indeed, the novel methods and systems described herein may be embodied in a variety of other forms; furthermore various omissions, substitutions and changes in the form of the methods and systems described herein may be made without departing from the spirit of the inventions. The accompanying claims and their equivalents are intended to cover such forms or modifications as would fall within the scope and spirit of the inventions. 
     For example, the notebook computer  10  incorporating an FM tuner, as in this embodiment, may be connected to the Internet so that the title of music on the air in FM broadcasting is displayed, and the user can select the displayed title and purchase the music.