Computer Cart
AssigneeBretford Manufacturing, Inc.
InventorsJack Guasta, Morad Ghassemian
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A computer cart has removable electrical connector management system which may be removed from the computer cart to install portable electronic device electrical transformers, and then reinserted into the computer cart to enable multiple electrical transformers to be installed into the cart as a group. An electrical charging system uses a staggered round robin approach to control distribution of power within the computer cart without requiring the amount of power used from each power strip to be individually monitored.
Claims17
1-17. (canceled)
A computer cart, comprising:
- a computer storage compartment;
- and
- a power distribution system, comprising:
- a current sensor connected to a power input line;
- a microprocessor operably connected to the current sensor for receiving an indication of a sensed current on the power input line, the microprocessor containing programmable logic to cause the microprocessor to activate charging zones on a staggered round robin basis.
The computer cart of claim 17, wherein each charging zone comprises a set of outlets.
The computer cart of claim 17, wherein each charging zone comprises a power strip having a set of outlets.
The computer cart of claim 17, wherein the charging zones are arranged in a predetermined order.
The computer cart of claim 17, wherein the charging zones do not include individual current sensors.
The computer cart of claim 17, wherein the microprocessor activates charging zones on a staggered round robin basis by:
- selecting a first charging zone;
- determining an amount of current drawn by the cart from the current sensor;
- and
- when the current drawn by the cart does not exceed a threshold, selecting a second charging zone from the available charging zones, and sequentially selecting additional charging zones according to a predetermined order until the current drawn by the cart approaches the threshold.
A computer storage system, comprising:
- a computer storage compartment;
- and
- a power distribution system, comprising:
- a current sensor connected to a power input line;
- a microprocessor operably connected to the current sensor for receiving an indication of a sensed current on the power input line, the microprocessor containing programmable logic to cause the microprocessor to activate charging zones on a staggered round robin basis.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.