Ex Parte Subramanian et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Aug 26, 2015

12182325 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 26, 2015)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
12/182,325 07/30/2008 Satish Subramanian 47415.195 3578
27683 7590 08/27/2015
HAYNES AND BOONE, LLP
IP Section
2323 Victory Avenue
Suite 700
Dallas, TX 75219
EXAMINER
GIARDINO JR, MARK A
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2135
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
08/27/2015 PAPER
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte SATISH SUBRAMANIAN, SENTHIL KANNAN,
HARIHARAN KAMALAVANNAN, and GANESH SIVAPERUMAN
____________

Appeal 2013-002189
Application 12/182,325
Technology Center 2100
____________

Before CAROLYN D. THOMAS, LINZY T. McCARTNEY, and
KIMBERLY McGRAW, Administrative Patent Judges.

THOMAS, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appellants seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the Examiner
finally rejecting claims 1–8, all the claims pending in the application. We
have jurisdiction over the appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We REVERSE.
The present invention relates generally to a low power consumption
storage array wherein read and write cycles are separated so that a multiple
disk array can be spun down during periods when there are no write
requests. See Abstract.

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Application 12/182,325

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Claim 1 is illustrative:
1. A method of reducing power consumption in a storage
array comprising:
writing data to a multiple disk array in response to a write
command;
synchronously copying said data from said multiple disk
array to a read spare drive;
reading data from said read spare drive, and not from said
multiple disk array;
spinning down said multiple disk array whenever a write
cycle has not been initiated for a predetermined period so that said
multiple disk array enters a passive state and consumes less energy;
writing additional data to solid state storage whenever an
additional write cycle is initiated and said multiple disk array is in said
passive state;
synchronously copying said additional data written to
said solid state storage to said read spare drive;
spinning up said multiple disk array in response to
initiation of said additional write cycle when said multiple disk array
is in said passive state;
writing said additional data written to said solid state
storage to said multiple disk array after said multiple disk array is
spun up;
flushing said additional data written to said solid state
storage after said data written to said solid state storage is written to
said multiple disk array.

Appellants appeal the following rejections:
R1. Claims 1 and 6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Balakrishnan (US 2009/0083483 A1, Mar. 26, 2009),
Young (US 5,680,579, Oct. 21, 1997), and Beal (US 5,155,845, Oct. 13,
1992);
R2. Claim 2 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Balakrishnan, Young, Beal, and Bearden (US
2004/0205298 A1, Oct. 14, 2004); and
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R3. Claims 3–5, 7, and 8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Balakrishnan, Young, Beal, Bearden, and Tavallaei
(US 6,101,459, Aug. 8, 2000).

ANALYSIS
Claims 1–8
Issue: Did the Examiner err in finding that Beal teaches or suggests
copying the data from the multiple disk array to a read spare drive, as set
forth in each of the independent claims?

Appellants contend that “the teaching of Beal of simply duplicating
the write requests directed to one of the data storage drives and sending the
duplicate requests to the second drive is entirely different from . . .
‘synchronously copying said data from said multiple disk array to a read
spare drive’” (App. Br. 8). We agree with Appellants.
In response, the Examiner finds that “the claim language does not
necessarily mean data must be copied from said multiple disk array to a read
spare drive. Rather, data from said multiple disk drive (that is, data identical
to data from said multiple disk array . . . ) is synchronously copied to a read
spare drive” (Ans. 5, citing Appellants’ Spec ¶ 11 and Beal col. 6, ll. 3–22).
In other words, the Examiner understands Appellants’ Specification to
merely state that “the data written to write volume group 120 is
synchronously copied to the read spare drive group 130” (Spec. ¶ 11; see
also Fig. 2), not that data is necessarily copied from the write volume group
120 to the spare drive group 130. As such, the Examiner concludes that
Beal’s teachings are consistent with Appellants’ Specification.
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However, we find that the Examiner has merely directed our attention
to one of Appellants’ alternative embodiments, not an exclusive
embodiment, because Appellants also cite paragraph 9 of Appellants’
Specification for supporting “synchronously copying said data from said
multiple disk array to a read spare drive” (see App. Br. 4)(emphasis added).
Here, Appellants’ Specification clearly supports requiring that data is copied
from the write volume group 120 to the read spare drive group 130 (see
Spec. ¶ 9).
The Examiner further notes that “even if the claim language required
data first being written to a multiple disk array and then read [from] the
multiple disk array and synchronously written to a read spare drive . . .”
Beal’s Fig. 1 illustrates this embodiment (see Ans. 5). However, we find
that the Examiner fails to persuasively illustrate how Beal’s Fig. 1 shows the
argued features. At best, Beal’s Fig. 1 merely illustrates sending a write
request from one multiple disk array to another (i.e., “[o]n each write request
. . . DSC 105 transmits the received write request over data link 106 to DSC
107 . . . a copy of each record written on one of disk drives 109 is also
written on one of disk drives 111” (Beal, col. 6, ll. 3–11)). However, Beal’s
aforementioned teaching fails to illustrate copying said data from said
multiple disk array to a read spare drive, as there is no connection between
Beal’s disk drives 109 and disk drives 111, i.e., directing data from one
multiple disk drive to another drive.
Thus, we disagree with the Examiner’s finding that Beal teaches
copying data from the multiple disk array to a read spare drive, as recited in
each of the independent claims. The Examiner has not found any of the
other references of record teach this feature. Since we agree with at least
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one of the arguments advanced by Appellants, we need not reach the merits
of Appellants’ other arguments. Accordingly, we will not sustain the
Examiner’s obviousness rejection of claims 1–8.

DECISION
The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1–8 is reversed.

REVERSED

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