Patent ID: 7817842

Claim:
A high-speed U.S. currency processing device for receiving a stack of U.S. currency bills and rapidly processing all the bills in the stack, the device comprising: an input receptacle positioned to receive a stack of bills to be processed; at least one output receptacle positioned to receive bills after processing; a transport mechanism comprising a transport drive motor and transport rollers, the transport mechanism being located between the input receptacle and the output receptacle and being adapted to transport the bills, one at a time, from the input receptacle to the output receptacle along a transport path, the transport mechanism being adapted to transport bills at a rate in excess of about 800 bills per minute; a denomination discriminating unit comprising at least two detectors positioned along the transport path between the input receptacle and the output receptacle and comprising a processor, the at least two detectors being disposed on opposite sides of the transport path so as to be disposed adjacent to first and second opposing surfaces of the bills, the at least two detectors generating characteristic information output signals in response to detected characteristic information, the characteristic information output signals being electrically coupled to the processor, the processor receiving the characteristic information output signals and generating a denomination signal in response thereto, the discriminating unit being adapted to denominate and total bills of a plurality of U.S. denominations at a rate in excess of about 800 bills per minute, the discriminating unit is adapted to denominate bills of the plurality of denominations including bills of different denominations having the same size; wherein the device is adapted to deliver any bill that has been successfully denominated and totaled to one and only one of the at least one output receptacle; and an output unit adapted to output the total value of the bills that have been successfully denominated and delivered to the one and only one of the at least one output receptacle.