Patent attributes
A wireless clock system includes a master clock or other master time source, and a plurality of slave clocks or repeater devices. Each slave clock can both wirelessly receive and wirelessly transmit time signals including current time data. To avoid conflicts among the slave clocks, each slave clock transmits time signals in a frequency-hopping manner over pseudo-randomized frequencies and at pseudo-randomized transmission start times. In another embodiment, power consumption at the slave clocks is minimized by activating and deactivating receivers within the slave clocks at predetermined times and at predetermined intervals, each interval being longer than the previous interval, until valid time signals are received from either the master clock or another slave clock. Calibration of the slave clock's time base is also performed.
