Patent ID: 7446491

Claim:
A system for managing two or more groups of actuators each said group having a plurality of actuators, said system comprising: two or more power supply units connected to a first bus; a cable including two or more second bus segments, said cable connected in series to all of said actuators in all of said two or more groups of actuators, said first bus electrically connected to each said second bus segment, each said second bus segment supplying power to one of said two or more groups of actuators, said cable further includes one or more communication wires; a computing device communicating over said communication wires with said two or more groups of actuators; wherein said computing device comprises program code usable by said computing device, said program code comprising; code configured to determine, from a status signal from each of said two or more power supply units and the number of said actuators in each said group of actuators requiring movement, if sufficient power is available from said two or more power supply units to move all of said actuators requesting movement; code configured to generate commands to move all of said actuators requiring movement when it is determined that sufficient power is available to move all of said actuators requiring movement; and code configured to generate commands to simultaneously move less than all of said actuators requiring movement when it is determined that sufficient power is not available to move all of said actuators requiring movement, wherein said commands to move less than all of said actuators are queued in order according to a predetermined criteria.