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 .
This action is in response to the communication filed on April 1, 2025.
Claims 1-16 are pending in this action.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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) 5-6 and 13-14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Liu et al. (US 2016/0275955).
As per claim 5, Liu discloses, a method for controlling an electronic device, the method comprising:
analyzing a bitstream received from an external electronic device (Paragraphs 0104-0109);
obtaining an inverse-quantization bit number for each division audible frequency band included in the bitstream (Paragraph 0133);
performing inverse-quantization on the bitstream for each audible frequency band using the inverse-quantization bit number (Paragraph 0133); and
outputting an audio signal generated by the inverse-quantization (Paragraphs 0130-0134).
As per claim 6, wherein the inverse-quantization bit number corresponds to a quantization bit number for each audible frequency band used for the external electronic device to perform quantization on an audio signal (Paragraphs 0130-0134).
As per claims 13-14, they are analyzed and thus rejected for the same reasons set forth in the rejection of claims 5-6, because the corresponding claims have similar limitations.
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.
Claim(s) 1-2, 7, 9-10, and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu et al. (US 2016/0275955) in view of Clark (US 2020/0027467).
As per claim 1, Liu discloses, a method for controlling an electronic device, the method comprising:
obtaining a quantization bit number for each division audible frequency band dividing an audible frequency band based on a preset
performing quantization using a quantization bit number corresponding to an audio signal for each division audible frequency band extracted from an audio signal output by reproduction of an audio content (0119-0123, and 0176-0183); and
generating an audio signal quantized for each division audible frequency band as a bitstream and transmitting the bitstream to an external electronic device through a radio channel (Paragraphs 0104-0106).
Liu does not explicitly disclose, dividing an audible frequency band based on a preset user’s hearing characteristic, however Clark discloses dividing an audible frequency band based on a preset user’s hearing characteristic (Paragraphs 0004 and 0009).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Liu by including dividing an audible frequency band based on a preset user’s hearing characteristic as taught by Clark for the advantage of providing an improved listening experience on an audio device of an audio file according to a user’s individual hearing profile (Paragraph 0002).
As per claim 2, Liu does not explicitly disclose, but Clark discloses, further comprising: setting the preset user’s hearing characteristic by performing hearing measurement for each division audible frequency band, on a user (Paragraph 0011).
As per claim 7, Liu does not explicitly disclose, but Clark discloses, further comprising: requesting information about a user’s hearing characteristic required to perform inverse-quantization, from the external device (Paragraphs 0011).
As per claims 9-10 and 15, they are analyzed and thus rejected for the same reasons set forth in the rejection of claims 1-2 and 7, because the corresponding claims have similar limitations.
Claim(s) 3, 8, 11, and 16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu et al. (US 2016/0275955) in view of Clark (US 2020/0027467) as applied to claims 1 above, and further in view of Crouse et al. (EP 259553A).
As per claim 3, Liu in view of Clark do not disclose, but Crouse discloses, further comprising: generating a quantization bit allocation table in which the quantization bit number for each division audible frequency band is updated by reflecting the preset user's hearing characteristic; and selecting one quantization bit allocation table from among a plurality of generated quantization bit allocation tables (Summary of the invention, col. 5, lines 30-50).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Liu in view of Clark by including quantization bit allocation tables as taught by Crouse for the advantage of sub-band speech coders depend on allocation of available bit capacity of a transmission medium to provide high quality coding (Abstract).
As per claims 8, 11, and 16, they are analyzed and thus rejected for the same reasons set forth in the rejection of claim 3, because the corresponding claims have similar limitations.
Claim(s) 4 and 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu et al. (US 2016/0275955) in view of Clark (US 2020/0027467) as applied to claims 1 above, and further in view of Kim et al. (20060136198).
As per claims 3 and 12, Liu in view of Clark do not disclose, but Crouse discloses, further comprising: lossless-encoding the audio signal quantized for each division audible frequency band (Paragraph 0008).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Liu in view of Clark by including lossless-encoding as taught by Kim for the advantage of audio data compression schemes become much more complicated than those that only stores PCM data, and have bitstreams containing not only quantized PCM data but also additional information for data compression (Paragraph 0008).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Kim (US 6,094,636) discloses, Scalable audio coding/decoding method and apparatus.
Mirzahasanloo et al. (US 10,559,315) discloses, extended-range coarse-fine quantization for audio coding.
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Abul K. Azad whose telephone number is (571) 272-7599. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, Bhavesh Mehta, can be reached at (571) 272-7453.
Any response to this action should be mailed to:
Commissioner for Patents
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, VA 22313-1450
Or faxed to: (571) 273-8300.
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August 25, 2026
/ABUL K AZAD/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2656
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