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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements filed 11/7/24 and 10/17 25 have been considered. The information disclosure statement (IDS) filed 6/12/25 has been placed in the file but has not been considered since a size fee assertion statement was not filed with this IDS.
Drawings
The drawings filed 11/7/24 are acceptable to the examiner.
Claim Objections
Claims1-20 are objected to because of the following informalities: It is noted that each of independent claims 1 and 13 set forth a “second sound sensor” without the claims previously providing a first sound sensor and therefor does not particularly and distinctly define the claimed arrangement in a logical order of elements. This language carries through each of the dependent claims. Applicant should initially set forth a first sound sensor in the claim with any subsequent sensor referred to as second sound sensor. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1, 2-3, 6, 9, 11-14,16-17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by EP 3644307 A1). Note applicant provided a copy of this reference on 6/12/25.
Re claims 1 and 13: McCutcheon teaches an open wearable acoustic device (see figure 2), comprising:
a support member (headphone HP);
a speaker (SP), physically connected to the support member, wherein an open space is formed between the speaker and an eardrum (ED) of a user when the acoustic device is worn on the user's head (see space between (SP) and (ED), figure 2;
a second sound sensor module (FB MIC), physically connected to the support member, and configured to capture a second sound and generate a second sound signal (output of the microphone) wherein a first preset relationship is satisfied (see for example equation (8)) between a transfer function (DFBM) from the speaker to the second sound sensor module and a transfer function (DE) from the speaker to the eardrum, and the first preset relationship is independent of a pose of the acoustic device; and
a noise reduction circuit (such as a processor (PROC), configured to:
obtain the second sound signal from the second sound sensor module,
adjust a noise reduction parameter of the noise reduction circuit (by tuning parameters of filter function, figure 3) based on the second sound signal and the first preset relationship to obtain an adjusted noise reduction parameter, and
perform active noise reduction based on the adjusted noise reduction parameter (by applying the filter parameters to the playback device (figure 3). The method operation limitations of claim 13 contains similar limitations as that set forth in claim 1. These method limitations correspond to the operation of those elements as discussed in claim 1 and are taught by those elements of McCutcheon as discussed above with respect to claim 1.
Re claims 2 and 14: note use of a first sound sensor (FF-MIC) that generates a signal that includes sounds from ambient noise (paragraph [0041]), perform active noise reduction using processor (such as PROC), obtain a first sound signal from the first sound sensor module, using a filter and tuning parameters of this filter generating noise cancellation (see figure 3) and sending this signal to a speaker (playback device) to reduce volume (i,e, amount of noise present) at eardrum (ED)
Re claim 3: se figure 1, relationships of microphones FF-MIC, FB-MIC, speaker SP and eardrum ED
Re claim 9: see figures 2 and 3, step 340 for the use of a feedback filtering and step 360 for use of feedforward filtering which are used in noise reduction being performed.
Re claims 6 and 17: see figure 1 and equation 9 teaching a relationship between AFBM and AE that is independent of the pose of the acoustic device and a noise reduction circuit (PROC) that uses each of the second sound signal, the first preset relationship and the second present relationship to adjust parameters used in the noise reduction (by tuning parameters of filter function, figure 3)
Re claim 11: See paragraph [0035] claims 11-13 along with figure 3 teaching the use of a medium storing instructions used by a process for control of the acoustic device to obtain each of the signals as set forth for performing an active noise reduction
Re claim 12: note the device used is disclosed as a headphone (HP), which is a common synonym of the claimed earphone satisfying the alternative language set forth.
Re claim 16: see discussion in paragraph [0049] along with figure 2 in which test signals are used for the determination of transfer functions by sensing a test signal, obtaining a audio signal captured and determining the transfer function as set forth
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-5, 7-8 ,10, 15, 18-20 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: The claimed acoustic device including in combination those features of claim 2/1 wherein the noise reduction circuit includes a feedforward filter, connected to the first sound sensor module and the speaker, and configured to filter the first sound signal; the noise reduction parameter includes a filter gain of the feedforward filter; and to adjust the noise reduction parameter, the noise reduction circuit is configured to: determine a first filter gain required by the feedforward filter to minimize the second sound signal, determine, based on the first filter gain and the first preset relationship, a second filter gain required by the feedforward filter in order to minimize the ambient noise at the eardrum, and adjust a current filter gain of the feedforward filter to be the second filter gain as set forth in claim 10 is neither taught by nor an obvious variation of the art of record. Similar features of claim 10 are worded using method terminology in claim 20/14/13. The claimed acoustic device including in combination those features of claim 1, wherein to adjust the noise reduction parameter of the noise reduction circuit, the noise reduction circuit is further configured to: measure the transfer function from the speaker to the second sound sensor module to obtain a first transfer function; determine ambient noise at the eardrum based on the first transfer function, the first preset relationship, and the second sound signal; and adjust the noise reduction parameter of the noise reduction circuit with in order to minimize the ambient noise at the eardrum as set forth in claim 4 is neither taught by nor an obvious variation of the art of record. Similar features of claim 4 are worded using method terminology in claim 15/13. The limitations of claim 5 depend upon those features of claim 4/1. The claimed acoustic device including in combination those features of claim 6/1, wherein to adjust the noise reduction parameter of the noise reduction circuit, the noise reduction circuit is configured to: measure the transfer function from the speaker to the second sound sensor module to obtain a first transfer function; determine ambient noise at the eardrum based on the first transfer function, the first preset relationship, the second preset relationship, and the second sound signal; and adjust the noise reduction parameter of the noise reduction circuit in order to minimize the ambient noise at the eardrum as set forth in clam 7 is neither taught by nor an obvious variation of the art of record. Similar features of claim 7 are worded using method terminology in claim 18/17/13. The claimed acoustic device including in combination those features of claim 1, wherein to adjust the noise reduction parameter of the noise reduction circuit, the noise reduction circuit is configured to obtain a target working mode among a plurality of working modes of the acoustic device, wherein in each working mode, the noise reduction circuit has a corresponding default noise reduction parameter, and default noise reduction parameters corresponding to different working modes are different; and adjust, based on the second sound signal and the first preset relationship, the default noise reduction parameter corresponding to the target working mode as set forth in claim 8 is neither taught by nor an obvious variation of the art of record. Similar features of claim 8 are worded using method terminology in claim 19/13.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ANDREW SNIEZEK whose telephone number is (571)272-7563. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 7:00 AM-3:30 PM EST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Ahmad Matar can be reached at 571-272-7488. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ANDREW SNIEZEK/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2693
/A.S./Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2693 7/14/26
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