Appeal No. 96-1707
Application 08/221,999
heads would have dictated the exact dimensions of the gap configuration.
REJECTION OF CLAIMS 10, 12 and 35 UNDER §103
Claims 10, 12 and 35 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 over Otsuka in view of
appellant's admitted prior art in the specification (pages 1-7 and Figures 12-16) and
Jones and applied against claims 7-9, 11, 13, 14, 29-34 and 36 further in view of Nomura.
(See answer at pages 10-11).
We disagree with the Examiner. As discussed above, we agree with the Examiner
concerning the basic combination of references and the teachings of the references.
2
Claims 10 and 12 add a limitation to the claimed invention to include "a trench portion
having a prescribed depth formed in a substrate on which said combined thin film
magnetic head is formed." The Examiner has argued that it would have been obvious to
one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention to include a groove "to prevent the
magneto-resistive element from directly facing the ferromagnetic material (the second
lower yoke made of highly permeable film of NiFe)." (See answer at page 10.) Appellant
argues that the trench portion is directly below the first yoke magnetic head and second
yoke magnetic head. (See brief at pages 18-21 and reply at pages 6-7.) Furthermore,
appellant argues that in claim 10, the second lower yoke is formed along the bottom of the
2 We note that the Examiner indicated in the answer at pages 2-3 that an error was present in
claim 12, but we further note that the amendment entered February 3, 1994 deleted the word "head"
accidentally from claim 12 in two places in line 5 after "magnetic."
7
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