JP2002176600A - Digital broadcasting receiver - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a digital broadcasting receiver with which a user can select his/her desired category with a small number of operating times. SOLUTION: Switching is made to a category selection mode by pressing down a category key CK provided on an operating part 10 for a prescribed period (e.g. 2 seconds). When a scan key provided in the operating part 10 is pressed down in the category selection mode, a controlling part 6 refers to a channel list in each category stored in a channel information memory 11, selects a representative channel in each category, switches categories every prescribed time to receive the representative channel.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a digital broadcast receiving apparatus, and more particularly to a digital broadcast receiving apparatus which receives a digital broadcast to be broadcast by adding category information to which the channel belongs, and receives a channel belonging to a different category at predetermined time intervals. The present invention relates to a broadcast receiving device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, digital broadcasting has been put to practical use. In digital broadcasting, by dividing channels using digital compression technology, the number of channels is greatly increased as compared with the conventional analog broadcasting mode. That is, a plurality of programs are multiplexed on one bit stream, and a plurality of such bit streams are transmitted, so that a very large number of programs are broadcast as a whole. In such digital broadcasting, in order to easily select a desired channel from a large number of channels, auxiliary information about the broadcasting channel includes a category to which the channel belongs, a song name, an artist name, an album name, etc. being broadcast. Is added to the broadcast.

[0003] To select a viewing channel, a user selects a channel by switching reception channels one by one using channel up / down keys provided on the operation unit, or selects a 10-key provided on the operation unit. To select a channel by directly inputting the channel number desired to view. In addition, a category can be designated, and a desired channel can be selected and received from a plurality of channels belonging to the designated category. When selecting a viewing channel after designating a category, for example, the category selection mode is first set by long-pressing the category key of the operation unit, and the category name to which the current reception channel belongs is displayed. Each time the category key is pressed, the category is sequentially switched to receive channels belonging to the category. Once the user has switched to the desired category,
This time, using the up / down key, the channels belonging to the category are switched one by one to receive a desired channel. In this way, a desired channel can be selected from a large number of broadcast channels.

[0004]

By the way, when selecting a channel using this category, it may be necessary to repeatedly press the category key many times to switch to the desired category. For example, if there are a total of 15 categories, 15 key operations are required to switch to the 15th category. It is conceivable to display a list of categories on the display unit of the receiving device and select a desired category from the list, but in a receiving device in which the area of the display unit cannot be so large like an in-vehicle receiving device, It is difficult to list multiple category names at once. Therefore, the category names are switched and displayed one by one. It is not preferable that the driver repeatedly performs the category switching operation while watching this display.

[0005] When there are a large number of categories, in order to know what channels are being broadcast in all the categories, the user must switch all the categories in order to find out what channels are being broadcast in each category. You must listen to the broadcasts of the channels belonging to the category to confirm. At this time, the user has to perform the switching operation by the number of types of the category, which is troublesome.

Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide a digital broadcast receiving apparatus capable of automatically switching and receiving a plurality of categories at predetermined time intervals and selecting a desired category with a small number of operations. is there.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a digital broadcast receiving apparatus capable of selecting a category without watching the display unit.

[0008]

According to the present invention, there is provided a digital broadcast receiving apparatus for receiving a digital broadcast signal in which a plurality of channels are multiplexed and to which category information to which the channels belong is added. This is achieved by a digital broadcast receiving apparatus comprising: category representative channel selecting means for selecting a representative channel; and category scanning means for switching and receiving a representative channel of each category selected by the category representative channel selecting means at predetermined time intervals. You.

That is, with the above-described configuration, a plurality of categories can be automatically switched at predetermined time intervals, and a representative channel of each category can be received.

Further, according to the present invention, there is provided a category selecting means for selecting a category to which a representative channel being received by the category scanning means belongs, and a plurality of channels belonging to the category selected by the category selecting means. And a channel selecting means for selecting a viewing channel from the digital broadcast receiving apparatus.

That is, with the above configuration, it is possible to select the category to which the representative channel being received belongs by category scan, and select a viewing channel from a plurality of channels belonging to the selected category.

Further, according to the present invention, there is provided a digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to the present invention, wherein the category representative channel selecting means selects a channel having the smallest channel number among a plurality of channels belonging to a category. Achieved.

Further, according to the present invention, the above object is attained by a digital broadcast receiving apparatus wherein the category representative channel selecting means randomly selects a channel from a plurality of channels belonging to a category.

[0014] According to the present invention, the above object is achieved when a plurality of categories are added to one channel.
The category representative channel selecting means is achieved by a digital broadcast receiving apparatus that selects a representative channel such that a representative channel of each category is different.

[0015]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of a digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to the present invention. In the figure, 1 is an antenna, 2 is a front end unit (F / E), 3 is a baseband processing unit, 4 is a data separation unit, 5 is an audio decoding unit, 6 is a control unit, 7 is an amplifier, and 8 is a speaker. , 9 is a display unit, 10 is an operation unit, 11 is a channel information memory, and 12 is a timer.

The front end unit 2 extracts a desired reception frequency component from the digital broadcast signal received via the antenna 1, and outputs an intermediate frequency signal obtained by performing frequency conversion on the extracted signal. .

The baseband processing section 3 performs quadrature demodulation processing and FEC (Forward Error Corr) on the intermediate frequency signal output from the front end section 2.
(Election) processing to demodulate the interleaved transmission data, further decompose the interleaved data to return to the original data string, perform error detection / correction processing, and output the data to the data separation unit 4.

The data separation unit 4 is a baseband processing unit 3
Then, the data sequence input from is separated into audio data and information data, the audio data is output to the audio decoding unit 5, and the information data is output to the control unit 6. Channel information such as a channel number, a channel name, and category information corresponds to the information data.

The audio decoder 5 decodes the input decoded data into an audio signal, outputs the audio signal to the amplifier 7, and outputs audio from the speaker 8.

The control unit 6 controls the entire digital broadcast receiving apparatus. The control unit 6 controls the frequency tuning by the front end unit 2, controls the instruction of the channels to be received by the baseband processing unit 3, and the audio / video decoding unit 5, It performs channel search control for searching for a channel belonging to a specified category, and displays a channel number, a channel name, a category name, and the like on the display unit 9. Further, the control unit 6 stores the information data input from the data separation unit 4 in the channel information memory 11 and uses it for a category scan operation described later, a display of a channel number, a channel name, a category name, and the like.

The operation unit 10 selects a reception channel,
A category scan instruction operation, a preset selection operation, a volume adjustment operation, and the like are performed.

The channel information memory 11 stores information data included in a broadcast wave, and includes a channel number,
A channel name, a list of channels to which each category belongs, and the like are stored.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram of a channel list belonging to each category in the information data stored in the channel information memory 11. The channel information memory 11 stores channels belonging to each category in association with each other. For example, the category “Classic” has channel numbers 1, 5,
Seven channels 7, 11, 12, 38, and 50 belong, and the category “lock” has channel numbers 2, 3,
Eight channels 4, 13, 15, 20, 29, and 40 belong. The correspondence between these categories and channel numbers is included in the information data added to the broadcast wave,
The control unit 6 stores the category in the channel information memory 11 in association with the channel number belonging to the category.
When the information data included in the broadcast wave is changed, the control unit 6 updates the channel list for each category stored in the channel information memory 11.

When the user operates the operation unit 10 to instruct the start of the category scan, the control unit 6
The categories are switched at predetermined time intervals in order from the category to which the currently receiving channel belongs, and the representative channel of each category is received. At this time, if a category is a desired category while a representative channel of a certain category is being received, the user operates the operation unit 10 to stop the category scan operation and set a channel within the category in which the scan operation is stopped. The user can select to switch to the desired channel.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram of a category switching operation when a category scan is performed. In the figure,
Reference numeral 9 denotes a display unit, and 10 denotes an operation unit, which is the same as that described in FIG. The operation unit 10 includes an up / down key UDK for switching channels and a category key C for switching to a category selection mode and for selecting a category.
K, a scan key SK for instructing start / stop of a scan operation. When the user instructs a category scan operation, the user presses the category key CK for a predetermined time (for example, 2 seconds) to enter the category selection mode, and then instructs the start of the category scan operation by pressing the scan key SK. I do. When the category scan operation is instructed, channel 1 which is the representative channel (the channel with the smallest channel number) of the category (in this example, “classic”) to which the channel currently being received belongs is received, and the category name and the channel are displayed on the display unit 9. Displays the number etc. And a predetermined time (for example, 5 seconds)
After the lapse of time, a channel 2 which is a representative channel of a channel belonging to the next category (in this example, the category “lock”) is received, and the display unit 9 displays a channel name, a channel number, and the like. Similarly, every time a predetermined time elapses,
Switch the category and receive the representative channel.

While receiving a channel of a desired category in this category scan, the user sets the scan key S
When the user instructs to stop scanning by pressing K, the category scanning operation is stopped and the category to which the currently receiving channel belongs is selected. For example, in the example shown in FIG. 3, when the user presses the scan key SK while receiving the representative channel 2 of the category “lock”, the category “lock” is selected, and the channel 2 received at that time is selected. Reception is continued.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of a channel selecting operation in a category performed after the category is selected. The user operates the operation unit 1
By operating the up / down key UDK provided at 0,
Channels belonging to the selected category can be switched. As shown in FIG. 4, the up / down key U
Every time the DK is operated, the channels belonging to the category are switched and received one by one. In the example shown in FIG. 4, the channels belonging to the category "lock" selected in the example of FIG. 3 are assigned the "hit chart" of the channel number 2, the "soft lock" of the channel number 3, and the channel by the up / down key UDK. The reception channels are sequentially switched, such as "Love Song" of number 4 and "60's lock" of channel number 13, so that the user can select a desired channel.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an operation flow of channel selection using category scan according to the present invention. First, when the user presses a category key provided on the operation unit 10 for a predetermined time (for example, 2 seconds), the mode is switched to the category selection mode, and the representative channel (for example, the category Is received (step S10).
1).

Next, in the category selection mode, the control section 6 determines whether or not the category key CK provided on the operation section 10 has been pressed (step S102).

If the category key CK is depressed in step S102, the control unit 6 refers to the channel information memory 11 to select a representative channel of the next category, and the front end 2, baseband processing unit 3, data The separation unit 4 and the like are controlled to receive the next representative channel (step S103), and the process returns to step S102 to continue the operation.

If it is determined in step S102 that the category key CK has not been pressed, the control unit 6 determines whether the up / down key UDK has been pressed (step S10).
4). In step S104, up / down key UDK
Is pressed, the control unit 6 refers to the channel information memory 11 to switch to another channel belonging to the current category (the next highest numbered channel or the next lowest numbered channel) to receive ( Step S105). Then, it is determined whether to end the category selection mode (step S106). If the category selection mode is not to be ended, the process returns to step S102 to continue the operation.

If the up / down key UDK is not pressed at step S104, the control unit 6
It is determined whether or not K has been pressed (step S107). If the scan key SK has not been pressed, the process proceeds to step S106. On the other hand, if the scan key SK is pressed in step S107, the control unit 6 refers to the channel information memory 11 and selects a representative channel of the next category, and the front end unit 2, baseband processing unit 3, data separation unit 4 and so on to receive a representative channel of the next category (step S108).

Thereafter, the control unit 6 determines whether or not a scan operation stop instruction has been issued based on whether the scan key SK has been pressed again (step S109). continue. If the scan stop instruction is not issued in step S109, the control unit 6 refers to the timer 12 and receives a current reception channel for a predetermined time (for example, 5 seconds).
It is determined whether or not the time has elapsed (step S110). If the predetermined time has not elapsed, the process returns to step S109 to continue the operation.

If the predetermined time has elapsed in step S110, the process returns to step S108, and the control section 6 refers to the channel information memory 11 to receive a representative channel of the next category and continue the operation.

When the category selection mode is terminated in step S106, the control section 6 continues to receive the currently receiving channel, and terminates the channel selection processing (step S111). The category selection mode is ended by pressing the category key CK again for a predetermined time (2 seconds) or automatically when there is no key input for a predetermined time (for example, 10 seconds) after selecting a channel. What should I do?

In this way, the categories can be automatically switched at predetermined time intervals, and the representative channels belonging to each category can be received.

In the above description of the embodiment, the representative channel of each category is the channel having the smallest channel number among a plurality of channels belonging to each category.
A representative channel may be selected at random from a plurality of channels belonging to each category.

In the description of the above embodiment, the category scan operation is performed by first switching to the category selection mode and then pressing the scan key. However, a key for instructing the operation unit to perform the category scan operation is separately provided. A category scan operation may be started by pressing the key.

Further, in the description of the above embodiment, the case where one channel belongs to one category has been described as an example, but one channel may belong to a plurality of different categories. In this case, when a representative channel of a category is selected, a representative channel of that category may be selected from channels excluding channels that have become representative channels in other categories. For example, as shown in FIG. 6, when the channel of channel number 2 belongs to two categories of the category “rock” and the category “pops”, if the channel number 2 is selected as the representative channel of the category “rock”, In the category “pops”, a representative channel is selected from five channels other than channel number 2 and channel numbers 12, 14, 44, 45, and 46. That is, in the category scan, a channel once received as a representative channel in a certain category is not set as a representative channel when receiving scans in another category. This prevents the same channel belonging to a plurality of categories from being received many times by one category scan operation.

The present invention has been described with reference to the embodiments.
The present invention can be variously modified in accordance with the gist of the present invention described in the claims, and the present invention does not exclude this.

[0041]

As described above, according to the present invention, the representative channels belonging to each category are received at predetermined time intervals, so that channels belonging to different categories can be sequentially listened to with a small number of operations, and the contents of the categories can be obtained. You can figure out. In addition, when selecting a channel using a category, the category can be specified with a few operations, which is convenient. In particular, in the in-vehicle receiving device, it is possible to reduce the number of category switching operations when selecting a viewing channel using a category, and also to select a desired category without watching the screen display, The burden on the driver can be reduced.

According to the present invention, since the representative channel of each category is set to the channel having the smallest channel number among the channels belonging to the category, the representative channel of each category can be processed without burdening the control unit. Can be selected.

According to the present invention, the representative channel of each category is randomly selected from the channels belonging to the category. Therefore, every time a category scan is instructed, a different representative channel is selected every predetermined time. It can provide the user with an opportunity to know which channels they can receive and listen to less.

According to the present invention, even when one channel belongs to a plurality of categories, a representative channel is selected and received from channels other than the channel which has become a representative channel in another category. Thus, the same channel is not received in a plurality of categories in a single category scan operation, and the user is not confused.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of a digital broadcast receiving apparatus of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram of a channel list for each category stored in a channel information memory.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram of a category switching operation when a category scan is performed.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of a channel selection operation in a category performed after a category is selected.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an operation flow of channel selection using a category scan.

FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an example where one channel belongs to a plurality of categories.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Antenna 2 ... Front end 3 ... Base band processing part 4 ... Data separation part 5 ... Audio decoding part 6 ... Control part 7 ... Amplifier 8 ... Speaker 9 ... Display unit 10 ... Operation unit 11 ... Channel information memory 12 ... Timer CK ... Category key SK ... Scan key UDK ... Up / Down key

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A digital broadcast receiving apparatus for receiving a digital broadcast signal to which a plurality of channels are multiplexed and to which category information to which a channel belongs is added, wherein: a category representative channel selecting means for selecting a representative channel for each category; A digital broadcast receiving apparatus comprising: category scan means for switching and receiving representative channels of each category selected by the representative channel selection means at predetermined time intervals. 2. A category selecting means for selecting a category to which a representative channel being received by the category scanning means belongs; and a channel selecting means for selecting a viewing channel from a plurality of channels belonging to the category selected by the category selecting means. The digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to claim 1, comprising: 3. The category representative channel selecting means,
3. The digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a channel having the smallest channel number is selected from a plurality of channels belonging to a category. 4. The category representative channel selecting means,
3. The digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a channel is randomly selected from a plurality of channels belonging to a category. 5. When a plurality of categories are added to one channel, the category representative channel selecting means selects a representative channel so that a representative channel of each category is different. The digital broadcast receiving device according to claim 1 or 2.