DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 7/8/2025 has been entered.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1-6 and 8-16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Turner-Fernback (published as US 20210375253 A1) in view of Asada et al. (published as US 20200202839 A1; hereafter Asada) and Kara et al. (published as US 20200374622 A1; hereafter Kara).
Regarding claim 1, Turner-Fernback discloses a noise cancellation enabled headphone (10 in Fig. 1, more detail shown in Fig. 6) to be worn on or over an ear of a user (not explicitly shown, but it is inherently included; [0042]), the headphone (10) comprising
a speaker (336);
a feed-forward microphone (356) predominantly sensing ambient sound (356 faces the ambient environment);
an error microphone (357) being arranged in front of the speaker (336) in a primary direction of sound emission of the speaker (the front direction of the speaker, or the direction to the ear drum) and adapted to sensing sound being output from the speaker (336) and ambient sound ([0048]); and
a baffle (340) arranged between the speaker (336) and the error microphone (357) in the primary direction of sound emission such that the sound being output from the speaker (336) is delayed (the inherent physical property of 340 in front of the speaker) by the baffle at a location of the error microphone (357);
wherein the headphone (10) is configured to record a feed-forward signal with the feed-forward microphone (356) and an error signal with the error microphone (357), and to provide the feed-forward signal and the error signal to an adaptive noise cancellation controller (346, the function of NC 348 is discussed in [0045]) being configured to perform feed-forward noise cancellation based on the feed-forward signal filtered with feed-forward filter parameters ([0045], [0067]-[0068]), and
wherein the ear cushion (343) of the headphone defines a first cavity (334) comprising an air volume between an inner portion of the headphone and the ear of the user (not explicitly shown in Fig. 6, but the ear is inherently presented when the headphone is placed on the ear).
Turner-Fernback fails to explicitly show the claimed feature “adjust the feed-forward filter parameters based on the error signal”. Turner-Fernback teaches a general FF noise cancellation circuit (348) without providing detail. One skilled in the art would have expected that any well known technique could be used without generating any unexpected result. In the same field of endeavor, Asada teaches an ANC circuit for an earpiece. The ANC circuit minimizes the error detected by the error microphone in FF scheme by adjusting the FF filter parameter (by 415) of FF filter (414) based on the detected error ([362], [0364], [0365], [0367], Fig. 33). Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Turner-Fernback by adjusting the NC circuit based on the detected error signal as taught in Asada in order to evaluate the effective of the noise cancellation at the ear drum and make necessary adjustment accordingly.
Turner-Fernback also fails to explicitly state that the area of sound reception of the error microphone is located generally equidistantly with respect to an ear cushion of the headphone and a second cavity. It appears, by the illustration as shown Figs. 5 and 6, the speaker (236 or 336) is located equidistantly with respect to the ear cushion (243 or 343) and paragraph [0065] clearly states that the speaker 236 is located coaxially with mount 240 which supports error microphone 256, so it appears that both the speaker and the error microphone 256 are located equidistantly with respect to the ear cushion. Kara is cited here to show the teaching more explicitly. The location of the speaker (111) is at the center of the ear cup and/or nearby the center of the ear pad 120 ([0035]) and error microphone (115) is located at the center of the speaker (111). See Figs. 1, 2, 3A and 3B. The ear cushion defines a first cavity when the headphone is placed on the ear. Regarding the claimed second cavity, a general microphone is not a vacuum and it has a volume (at least the thickness of a diaphragm which reads on the claimed defined depth) and a housing to support the microphone’s diaphragm. The housing reads on the claimed second cavity. The side of the microphone that detects sound reads on the claimed area of sound reception. Kara is cited here to show the teaching of the second cavity more explicitly. The microphone (115) is enclosed in a second cavity (112, 116; see Fig. 3A). The area of sound reception is the opening (113; [0036], [0053]) of the second cavity. Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify the combination of Turner-Fernback and Asada in view of Kara and/or general structure of a microphone by mounting the speaker and the error microphone equidistantly with respect to the cushion in order to allow the sound to be transmitted to the ear canal with less obstacle as possible and providing a support for the microphone.
Regarding claim 2, Turner-Fernback illustrates that the baffle (340) does not delay the ambient sound being sensed by the error microphone (357) and entering an air volume between the speaker (336) and an ear of a user at an ear cushion (343) of the headphone (the ambient noise entered through the leakage due to the improper fit of the cushion is not delayed by the baffle 340 as it reaches the error microphone 357, [0048]).
Regarding claim 3, Turner-Fernback shows wherein the baffle (340) increases a sound route between the speaker (336) and the error microphone (357), in particular compared to a direct sound route between the speaker (336) and the error microphone (357) without the baffle (340) (the claimed feature is an inherent property caused by the baffle 340, without baffle 340, the sound from the speaker will be detected by the error microphone 357 directly and in a shorter amount of time). The same effect occurs by the housing formed by 112 and 116 in Kara.
Regarding claim 4, Turner-Fernback shows that the baffle (340) is acoustically opaque, such that the sound being output from the speaker (336) propagates to the error microphone (357) along the baffle (340) (340 blocks the sound from the speaker 336 to reach the microphone 357 directly). The same effect occurs by the housing formed by 112 and 116 in Kara.
Regarding claim 5, Turner-Fernback shows that an acoustically resistive baffle (340), so the sound propagates along a path of less resistance (the path not blocked by 340). The same effect occurs by the housing formed by 112 and 116 in Kara.
Regarding claim 6, the combination of Turner-Fernback and Kara teaches that an area of sound reception of the error microphone (357) is located generally equidistantly with respect to a circumferential ear cushion (343).
Regarding claim 8, Turner-Fernback shows a circumaural headphone ([0042]).
Regarding claim 9, Turner-Fernback shows that the baffle (340) at least partially covers an active area of sound emission of the speaker (336) (the baffle is located in the front path of the speaker 336, thus partially covers the active area of the sound emission of the speaker). The same is shown in Kara.
Regarding claim 10, Turner-Fernback shows that the baffle (340) covers between 30% and 95% of an active area of sound emission of the speaker (336). The same is shown in Kara.
Regarding claim 11, Turner-Fernback shows that the baffle (340) is located basically centrally in front of an active area of sound emission of the speaker (336). The same is shown in Kara.
Regarding claim 12, Turner-Fernback shows a diaphragm of the speaker (336 is the diaphragm) is arranged in a cavity or a housing of the speaker (the cavity or housing of the speaker is shown in Fig. 6), and wherein an outlet of the cavity or the housing determines the active area of sound emission of the speaker (as illustrated in Fig. 6).
Regarding claims 13 and 14, Turner-Fernback fails to show feedback noise cancellation based on the error signal filtered with feedback filter parameters or a feedback microphone for providing a feedback signal to be filtered by feedback noise cancellation with feedback filter parameter. In Fig. 36, Asada teaches that the headphones with an error microphone (320-3) and a feedback microphone (320-1). The adaptive noise cancellation controller includes FF scheme (414) of filtering the detected ambient noise (by 320-2) with filter parameters modified based on the error signal detected by the error microphone (320-3) and FB scheme (413) of filtering the detected feedback signal (by 320-1) with filter parameter modified with feedback filter parameters (as determined by 416) ([389]). Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Turner-Fernback by replacing the adaptive noise cancellation controller with the one as taught in Asada and including a feedback microphone in order to use the combination of FF scheme and FB scheme to provide a more effective noise cancellation at ear drum.
Regarding claim 15, Turner-Fernback shows the adaptive noise cancellation controller (346) ([0045]).
Regarding claim 16, Turner-Fernback fails to explicitly state that the baffle covers between 50% and 80% of an active area of sound emission of the speaker. It appears that the baffle (340) covers a substantial active area of the sound emission of the speaker (336) without affecting the noise cancellation function. The same as shown in Kara. Since the baffle in Turner-Fernback supports the error microphone 357, the surface area of the baffle depending on the size of the error microphone. Furthermore, to make the size of the cup being small and light weight, one skilled in the art would have been motivated to use a compact speaker which could have a size not much larger than the size of the microphone. Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify the combination of Turner-Fernback, Asada and Kara by trying compact speakers in different sizes, including one with a size just a bit bigger than the baffle with the baffle covering 50%-80% of the active area of sound emission, as the speaker for generating anti-noise signal in order to select the best compact speaker for doing the job while reducing the weight and size of the cup to be mounted on the user’s ear.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
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/PING LEE/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2695