JP2014013467A - Notebook type personal computer - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To achieve both lightness in weight and rigidity in a lower housing of a notebook type personal computer.SOLUTION: A notebook PC 1 has a lower housing 102 having a first housing component 109 made of molded metal components, and a second housing component 110 made of pressed metal components.

Description

  The present invention relates to a notebook personal computer, and more particularly to a housing structure of a notebook personal computer.

  In the technical field of notebook personal computers (hereinafter referred to as notebook PCs), the demand for weight reduction and thinning is severe, and as much weight reduction and thinning as possible are possible as long as users can provide satisfactory performance. It has been demanded. However, in developing a notebook PC that is relatively thinner than the conventional one, a new problem that has not been made obvious has been found.

  As a problem associated with the thinning of notebook PCs, there is a problem that the rigidity of the housing tends to be insufficient. If the structure of the notebook PC case is regarded as a substantially rectangular parallelepiped, the longest side is the longest side, the longest side is the next long side, and the remaining side is the height, the thinning is regarded as making the height as low as possible be able to. Then, since the height of the substantially rectangular parallelepiped becomes relatively short with respect to the area constituted by vertical and horizontal due to the thinning, the rectangular parallelepiped becomes weak to twist and crack.

  Further, reducing the thickness of each surface constituting the casing of the notebook PC as much as possible is one means for realizing a reduction in thickness. Also in this case, since each surface becomes relatively thinner than the conventional one, it becomes easy to break or bend easily.

  Patent Document 1 is cited as a prior art document related to the present invention. Patent Document 1 describes that a magnesium lithium alloy is used as a casing material of a portable electronic device. However, there is no consideration as to what kind of components should be used in practice, and the problem regarding rigidity cannot be solved.

JP 2000-119787 A

  Conventional notebook PCs usually have a casing made of plastic for reasons such as easy plastic processing and low cost. Regarding the use of metal for the casing, for example, there is a product example in the US Apple Computer Co., Ltd., but we would like to make it lighter and thinner than such a conventional example.

  By the way, a notebook PC is usually divided into an upper casing provided with a display and a lower casing containing a calculation device and a storage device. In the present application, in particular, an object is to reduce the weight and increase the rigidity of the lower housing.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and an object of the present invention is to achieve both lightness and rigidity in the lower housing of a notebook personal computer.

  In order to achieve the above object, the inventors have repeated trial and error, and as a result, have found that the above-mentioned problems can be solved by the following configuration, and have completed the invention.

  In other words, according to the present invention, the notebook has a lower housing having a first housing component made of a metal component by casting and a second housing component made of a metal component by press working. Type personal computer is provided.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to achieve both lightness and rigidity in the lower housing of a notebook personal computer.

It is a figure which shows the external appearance of embodiment by this invention. It is the conceptual diagram which looked at the 1st housing | casing component 109 of FIG. 1 from the back surface. It is the conceptual diagram which looked at the 2nd housing | casing component 110 of FIG. 1 from the back surface.

Embodiments according to the present invention will be described below.
Referring to FIG. 1, the appearance of this embodiment is shown. The notebook PC 1 according to the present embodiment has a configuration in which an upper housing 101 and a lower housing 102 are connected by a hinge portion 104.

  The upper housing 101 is provided with a display 103. The lower housing 102 is provided with a touch pad 107 on the front side and a keyboard 108 on the back side facing the display 103.

  Note that the physical arrangement relationship in the present embodiment is an example, and does not limit the invention.

  The upper housing 101 and the lower housing 102 can rotate around the hinge portion 104. In FIG. 1, the upper housing 101 rotates with an angle of about 135 ° with respect to the lower housing 102 around the hinge portion 104.

  The upper housing 101 is configured to hold the display 103 between the display frame 105 and the top surface 106. The top surface 106 is disposed on the back side of the display frame 105 and is in a position that cannot be seen in FIG.

  The lower housing 102 has a first housing component 109 and a second housing component 110. The first casing component 109 and the second casing component 110 constitute a substantially rectangular parallelepiped lower casing 102, and a hollow space is formed inside the lower casing 102. In this hollow space, an arithmetic device and a storage device of the notebook PC 1, for example, a battery pack, a central arithmetic device, a motherboard, an SSD (Solid State Drive), and various fans are installed.

  Both the first casing component 109 and the second casing component 110 are preferably highly rigid metal components. Rigidity is increased with the same thickness as compared to a conventionally known publicly-used plastic. In addition, thermal conductivity is increased, which is advantageous for waste heat.

  FIG. 2 shows a conceptual diagram of the first casing component 109 as viewed from the back side. Here, the back surface means the surface on the side that becomes the back surface when the outer surface is the front surface when assembled as shown in FIG. As shown in FIG. 2, the first housing component 109 includes a standing wall 111, a touch pad installation unit 107a, and a keyboard installation unit 108a.

  The touch pad installation unit 107 a is a hole installed in the first housing component 109 in order to install the touch pad 107. Similarly, although the keyboard installation part 108a is a part for installing the keyboard 108, it is preferably not a hole from the viewpoint of rigidity.

  From the viewpoint of rigidity, the keyboard 108 is preferably a so-called isolation keyboard. In this case, the keyboard installation portion 108a is a lattice-like member that isolates each key. In this case, the keyboard installation portion 108 a is formed by being integrally molded with the first housing component 109.

  Since it is necessary to provide a part for installing a user interface, such as the touchpad installation unit 107a and the keyboard installation unit 108a, the first casing component 109 is a metal component, and a manufacturing method thereof. Is preferably casting (particularly pressure die casting). The metal part by casting has an advantage that a casing part having relatively high rigidity can be obtained at a low cost.

  FIG. 3 shows a conceptual diagram of the second casing component 110 as viewed from the back side. As shown in FIG. 3, the second casing component 110 has a standing wall 112. Moreover, when screwing in order to obtain the strength after an assembly | attachment, it has a screw hole in arbitrary places.

  The second housing part 110 is preferably a metal part by press working. According to the press working, there is less waste of material and better working efficiency than by simply forging.

  The material of the second casing component 110 is preferably a magnesium alloy. More preferably among magnesium alloys, magnesium lithium alloys such as LA141 (Mg-14% Li-1% Al) alloy and LZ91 (Mg-9% Li-1% Zn) alloy are used for the reasons described below. preferable.

  Magnesium and aluminum have lower specific gravity than iron, and the alloy can reduce the weight of the housing. The specific gravity of iron is about 7.9, while aluminum is about 2.7 and magnesium is about 1.8. In general, the lighter the specific gravity of the light metal, the lighter the housing can be made, and the rigidity can be increased when the housing is made with the same mass. By producing a casing component using a magnesium alloy, both robustness and light weight can be achieved.

  Magnesium alloys that are put into practical use (specific gravity about 1.8) are considered to be the lightest metal materials among the materials that are put into practical use as housing materials. However, the magnesium lithium alloy has a specific gravity lower than this (specific gravity around 1.3). For example, in the LA141 alloy, the specific gravity is 1.34. By using a magnesium alloy (including a magnesium lithium alloy) as a metal casing, further weight reduction is realized.

  However, the magnesium lithium alloy is more chemically active and difficult to handle than the magnesium alloy due to the inclusion of the lithium alloy. Therefore, pressing is particularly advantageous.

  However, the second casing component 110 obtained by pressing is difficult to provide bosses or ribs. Moreover, since it is a difficult material to handle, it is relatively expensive and the waste of the material must be reduced as much as possible. Therefore, in this embodiment, all the built-in components are attached to the first housing component 109. The built-in components refer to members stored in the lower housing 102, such as the computing device and storage device of the notebook PC 1, such as a battery pack, a central processing unit, a motherboard, an SSD (Solid State Drive), and various fans. Point to.

  The built-in component must be fixed in the lower housing 102. In the present embodiment, the second housing component 110 is simply a lid by attaching the built-in component to the first housing component 109. It works like Therefore, the second casing component 110 realizes extremely high weight while maintaining the rigidity of the entire lower casing 102.

1 Notebook PC
DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 101 Upper housing | casing 102 Lower housing | casing 103 Display 104 Hinge part 105 Display frame 106 Top surface 107 Touchpad 107a Touchpad installation part 108 Keyboard 108a Keyboard installation part 109 1st housing part 110 2nd housing part 111 Standing wall 112 Standing wall

Claims (4)

  A notebook personal computer comprising a lower casing having a first casing part made of a metal part by casting and a second casing part made of a metal part by pressing.   2. The notebook personal computer according to claim 1, wherein a member housed in the lower housing is attached to the first housing component.   3. The notebook personal computer according to claim 1, wherein the second casing part is made of a magnesium alloy.   4. The notebook personal computer according to claim 3, wherein the magnesium alloy is LA141.

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