US 5,751,548 · Granted 1998-05-12
IBM's Rotating Laptop Dock That Turned Dashboards Into Command Centers
Imagine a car mount for a laptop that lets you spin and tilt the screen in three directions — up, down, and sideways — so you can see it from any angle while driving. It even heats up the computer so cold weather doesn't kill the battery. This patent is basically the ancestor of every car-mounted tablet you see today.
The plain-English version
What it protects
The patent covers a docking station that grips a portable computer and allows its screen to rotate in three different planes simultaneously. What's protected here is the mechanical system that enables this multi-directional movement, plus the heated holder portion that warms the computer to keep it working in cold environments. The claim extends to the entire vehicular computer assembly that incorporates these features.
Why it matters
This patent, filed in the late 1990s, captures IBM's vision for how mobile computing would integrate into vehicles before smartphones existed. It addresses a real problem: drivers needed to view and interact with screens while driving, but traditional mounts only offered limited angles. The three-plane rotation system and the integrated heating element were innovations that made laptops genuinely usable in cars during winter. This pioneering approach to vehicular mobile computing helped establish design patterns still used in modern car mounts and dashboards.
Real-world use
When a rideshare driver or fleet manager mounts a GPS-enabled laptop on their dashboard and rotates it to catch sunlight while keeping the screen visible, they're benefiting from the spatial freedom this docking mechanism pioneered.
Original USPTO abstract
A portable computer docking station that is capable of allowing rotational movement of the computer's viewable screen in at least three different planes, thereby facilitating viewing and other utilization (e.g., using a pen) of the screen within a motor vehicle. The docking station defined herein is provided with a means for heating the portable computer when the computer is positioned in the docking station's holder portion. The heated holder portion effectively solves the problem of maintaining a portable computer at an operable temperature in cold environments. A vehicular computer assembly is also provided.
Patent details
- Publication number
- US 5,751,548
- Filing date
- 1997-02-28
- Grant date
- 1998-05-12
- Assignee
- International Business Machines Corporation
- Inventor(s)
- HALL; CHARLES WILLIAM, RIZZI; JULIAN DOMINICK, STUBECKI; JOHN ARTHUR
- CPC class
- F16C11/10
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