Appeal No. 2004-1822
Application No. 09/550,863
The specification has a similar description on page 4, at
lines 8-17.
In view of the above excerpts from appellants’
specification, we determine that the use of the word “echo” in
the claims is not indefinite, as the specification adequately
details the function of the echo plug such that this term is
definite as used in the claims.
We therefore reverse the 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph,
rejection.
II. The 35 U.S.C. §103 rejection of claims 1-3 and 8-10 under 35
U.S.C. §103 as being unpatentable over DeJaco in view of
Fujiwara and Hardy and Larkin and Hendershot
We consider claims 1 and 8 in this rejection.
Claim 1
Claim 1 requires, inter alia, “a circuit configured to
couple the speaker connection to the microphone connection”
[emphasis added].
The examiner’s position with regard to claim 1 is set forth
on pages 3-4 of Paper No. 10.
Upon our review of the applied art and the examiner’s
position, we find that DeJaco discloses a loopback in a mobile
station, and not within a phone. Fujiwara does not disclose a
circuit configured to couple the speaker connection to the
microphone connection; rather Fujiwara discloses an acoustic path
18 (see Figure 1 and column 4, lines 16-23).2
Because claim 1 requires that the echo plug apparatus
includes a circuit configured to couple a speaker connection to a
microphone connection, we determine that the combination of
2 The examiner discusses Hardy, Hendershot, and Larkin for teaching
systems involving a loopback function. See page 5 of Paper No. 10.
These references do not cure the above-mentioned deficiencies of
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