Appeal No. 1999-1697
Application No. 08/550,270 Page 10
that current solutions have been to essentially build separate
analog and digital devices which may be incorporated within a
single housing, for example, hybrid devices and physically
separate cards which separately perform these incompatible
digital and analog functions and which separately connect to
digital or analog interfaces. Blackwell recognizes
(col. 2, line 59 to col. 3, line 2) that:
Current solutions to the analog and digital
incompatibility problem have been inadequate,
however, because such current solutions have simply
physically combined otherwise separate sets of analog
and digital hardware, into one package having both
analog and digital interfaces, often with redundant
hardware such as microprocessors, RAM and ROM. The
need has arisen, therefore, for a single, integrated
data communications device which will provide complete
analog and digital data transmission services, heretofore
provided by separate, independent, and incompatible
devices.
From this background disclosure of Blackwell, we find that both
appellants and Blackwell recognize similar problems in the prior
art, as well as the solution of constructing a single integrated
device for performing both analog and digital functions. From
the embodiment of figure 9 of Blackwell, we find that Blackwell
discloses a single device having a single DSP for activating both
analog and digital transceivers. In addition, Blackwell states
(col. 12, lines 65-68) that data communications device 500 is
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