Soft Carrying Case

Soft carrying cases for battery-powered, hand-held calculators are known in the prior art. Such battery-powered calculators, as well as other battery-powered devices such as cassette tape recorders, frequently include miniature or micro-miniature power-on switches which are easily, though inadvertently, actuated through the soft fabric or other pliable material of the carrying case. Thus, a user may unknowingly carry his device around while uselessly depleting its batteries of their power. In addition, the user may inadvertently enclose his device in its respective carrying case without first turning it off, thus continuing to deplete the battery power after use.

A carrying case constructed according to the preferred embodiment of the present invention provides a substantially transparent, non-pliable insert positioned on the carrying case to correspond to the position of the power-on switch of the device when enclosed therein. The insert, being non-pliable, precludes the power-on switch from being inadvertently actuated. Since the insert is also substantially transparent, the position of the power-on switch can be observed by the user. If large enough to also include any illuminated read-out of the calculator or other indicator of power-on status, the user may not have to rely on observation of the position of the power-on switch but, rather, can determine whether the device is on from observing the illuminated read out.

FIG. 1 is the perspective view of a soft carrying case constructed according to the preferred embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2a is a top view of the insert for the soft carrying case of FIG. 1.

FIG. 2B is a cross-sectional view of the insert of FIG. 2A.

Referring to FIG. 1, carrying case 10 is formed of soft, pliable, resilient material such as leather or vinyl to accommodate a hand-held, battery-powered calculator it encases, and includes non-pliable substantially transparent insert 15. The position of insert 15 is determined to correspond to the location of the power-on switch on the calculator when enclosed therein. The actual shape of carrying case 10 is not critical to practice this invention except that the entire case or at least the inside shape thereof should conform substantially to the contours of the device it encloses such that 1) there is only one case-to-device orientation, or 2) there is a plurality of inserts, for example, insert 13, positioned on the carrying case to correspond to the locations that the power-on switch of the device can have for all possible case-to-device orientations.

While the peripheral shape of the insert is also not critical to practice this invention, insert 15 has a substantially circular peripheral shape as shown in FIG. 2A.

Referring now to FIG. 2B, inserts 13 and 15 comprise window 18 sandwiched between rings 16 and 17 which are held together by compression fit, the interference being between the outside diameter of ring 16 and the inside diameter of ring 17. The case material around the periphery of an opening therein to receive the insert is also clamped by rings 16 and 17, thereby holding the insert firmly in place.