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Microsoft Settles With Immersion Over Haptic Patent

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the wheels-greased-with-cash dept.

Dolly_Llama writes "Immersion settled their lawsuit against Microsoft over the use of Haptic vibration technology in the XBox controllers. Microsoft paid Immersion $26M to settle and to license Immersion's haptic patents. Immersion has a similar lawsuit still pending with Sony."

8 of 28 comments (clear)

  1. Repetitive Haptic Injury? by quinkin · · Score: 3, Funny
    So at least we know who to blame now for the long term damage caused by vibrating console controls...

    Q.

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    1. Re:Repetitive Haptic Injury? by quinkin · · Score: 4, Funny
      Well thats what my wife keeps saying is causing her sore wrists.....

      Hey wait....

      Q. :)

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  2. Anybody else remember... by NanoGator · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ... when Sony was sued by ... uh.. I think it was Atari over vibration inside of controllers? Something about Nintendo not getting sued because the N64's vibration feature was a peripheral and not built into the controller.

    This ring a bell with anybody? Now I'm kinda curious what happened.

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    1. Re:Anybody else remember... by paulcammish · · Score: 2, Interesting
      As I recall, it was Ninty who were after Sony for that.

      Japan got the Dual Analog Pad, complete with a small motor in one of the grips for the vibration, but Europe and the US the motor was missing (all the control circuitry was still there), and you could take it apart and add your own motor.

      What probably happened was that Ninty got annoyed (they seem to have a number of patents on the subject), Sony removed the motor for a while, and re-introduced it with TWO motors, rather than one probably to get round the patent, hence the later Dual Shock pads.

  3. Yet another strategic cave-in on a patent dispute by PenguinOpus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Immersion seems more likely to have a strong patent in haptic than SCO has any claims on Linux, but...

    This seems like a strategic settlement by Microsoft to punish Sony. Microsoft paying the settlement to Immersion gives Immersion fuel to feed its lawyers in their continued attack on Sony. You can be sure that when Sony settles or is taken to court the total will be $260M, not $26M.

  4. Why didn't MS just buy them? by mhesseltine · · Score: 3, Funny

    Then, they would be the ones collecting royalties from SONY.

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  5. Re:Why didn't they sue Nintendo? by Gr33nNight · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Ive read in various places that Nintendo has $6 Billion in its war chest.

    They are doing pretty good thanks to the GBA.

  6. Re:Why didn't they sue Nintendo? by vaguelyamused · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Never mind that the GameBoy Adavnce is currently outselling the PS2 in the States. Or that they actually make a profit of off each one sold.

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