Appeal No. 1998-0476
Application 08/397,157
claim 7 “cannot be utilized” because it repetitively resets
itself each “predetermined time” when operating in the RAM
mode (answer-pages 3 and 4).
Appellants argue that the microcomputer can be
utilized because the microcomputer is switched to the ROM mode
“from time to time”, and thus will not reset (brief-pages 14
and 15).
We agree with Appellants for the following reason.
As Appellants have noted, the microcomputer is switched to the
ROM mode “from time to time”. When in the ROM mode, the
signals to the monitoring circuit are not suppressed. Thus
the monitoring circuit is automatically reset, and will not
overflow. If the monitoring circuit does not overflow, the
microcomputer will not be reset, and can be utilized.
More specifically, looking at Figure 4, step 36
activates the application function that was loaded into the
RAM in step 33. Step 36 is expanded in Figure 5. Here, we
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