SMSC Assigned Patent

SMSC Holdings S.A.R.L., Luxembourg, a subsidiary of Standard Microsystems Corp,has been assigned a patent (8,924,749) developed by Intrater Gideon David, Sunnyvale, CA, for a “software controlled power limiting in USB to SATA bridge.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A Universal Serial Bus, (USB) to Serial ATA,(SATA) bridge device and method for operating same in a USB connected mass storage subsystem supports software management of power consumption. The USB to SATA bridge estimates power consumption based on known power consumption characteristics of SATA disk drives when performing commands involved in accessing SATA drive, or takes measurements of power consumption during execution of commands to determine when responses to a USB host device are to be delayed. By selectively delaying responses to the USB host device issuing the commands, the USB to SATA bridge manages the rate at which the host issues commands to the USB mass storage subsystem and is thereby able to automatically limit power consumption of the USB mass storage subsystem to that that available over the USB link.”

The patent application was filed on December 20, 2010(12/972,773)