JP2002252814A - Digital broadcast receiver - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a digital broadcast receiver in which a current time can be held or a reservation operation can be guaranteed even during a period where time information cannot be acquired from a broadcast signal. SOLUTION: Time information and preservation information from a user superposed on a broadcast signal is stored in a nonvolatile memory 107 and power interruption time is measured by an internal clock 108 upon occurrence of power interruption. When power supply is started after power interruption, the current time is calculated by adding the time information from the nonvolatile memory 107 immediately before power interruption and the power interruption time from the internal clock 108 until current time information is acquired from the broadcast signal and held in a clock circuit 104.

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 that performs time complementation when power is supplied after power is turned off.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A conventional digital broadcast receiving apparatus uses time information superimposed on a broadcast signal as current time information.

In a conventional digital broadcast receiving apparatus, a power cutoff state may occur in an energized state depending on the weather or the state of a power supply system. However, in the case of an instantaneous power failure, hardware is used so that power supply is not cut off. Measures have been taken. On the other hand, for a non-instantaneous power failure such as a voluntary power down, the power supply is cut off, and the system must be restarted after the power is turned on again. If the system is restarted, there will be a period during which the current time information cannot be obtained from the broadcast signal due to system initialization processing, etc., and the current time cannot be displayed by on-screen display during that period. There is a problem that a delay occurs in the reservation start of the reservation.

Here, as in a digital broadcast receiver disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2000-165768, there is an attempt to keep the current time information at all times by measuring the current time with an internal clock.

[0005]

However, the internal clock used in the above-mentioned conventional digital broadcast receiver can display the current time instantly after the power is turned on again. However, there is a problem in use such as when and who correctly sets the time. Therefore, there is a problem that accuracy and reliability are lacking.

[0006] The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and has as its object to provide a digital broadcast receiving apparatus capable of retaining current time information even during a period in which current time information cannot be obtained from a broadcast signal. And

[0007]

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a digital broadcast receiving apparatus, comprising: a nonvolatile memory for storing time information; and a power cutoff time from when the power is cut off to when the power supply is started. Means for measuring the power-off time, and time information superimposed on the broadcast signal is stored in a non-volatile memory, and when the power is cut off, the power-off time measuring means starts measuring the power-off time, and the power is turned off. When the power supply is started later, control means for reading the time information immediately before power-off from the nonvolatile memory and reading the power-off time from the power-off time measuring means, and the time information read by the control means. It has an adding means for adding the power-off time and a time holding means for holding current time information.

Therefore, when the power supply is started after the power is turned off, the current time is calculated by adding the time information immediately before the power is turned off and the power-off time until the current time information is obtained from the broadcast signal. As a result, the current time information can be always held.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to the first aspect, the non-volatile memory further stores reservation information, and the non-volatile memory stores the reservation information stored in the non-volatile memory. A reservation management means for managing a reservation operation based on the information.

Therefore, when the power supply is started after the power is turned off, the reservation operation can be started immediately.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, there is provided a digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to the first or second aspect, wherein a standby microcontroller is used as a power-off time measuring means.

Therefore, not only the effect of claim 1 or 2 can be obtained, but also the power consumption can be reduced.

[0013]

(Embodiment 1) FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to a first embodiment of the present invention.

The digital broadcast receiving apparatus shown in FIG. 1 includes a tuner circuit 101, a digital tuning circuit 102, a video processing circuit 103, a clock circuit 104, an on-screen display circuit 105, a microcontroller 106, a nonvolatile memory 107, and an internal clock 108. It has.

The tuner circuit 101 performs processing such as channel selection and demodulation on the received broadcast signal, and outputs a transport stream obtained as a result of the processing to the digital tuning circuit 102.

The digital tuning circuit 102 extracts a video elementary stream, an audio elementary stream, and current time information from the transport stream from the tuner circuit 101. The video elementary stream is output to the video processing circuit 103, and the audio elementary stream is output to a speaker as an audio signal via an audio processing circuit (not shown). Then, the current time information is output to the clock circuit 104.

The video processing circuit 103 performs various adjustments on the video elementary stream from the digital tuning circuit 102 and the video signal from the on-screen display circuit 105, and then outputs the adjusted video signal to an external display device or the like. .

The clock circuit 104 includes the digital tuning circuit 10
2 and current time information from microcontroller 106
Holds current time information from. The current time information from the digital channel selection circuit 102 is stored in the microcontroller 1.
06 and the process of outputting the current time information held in the clock circuit 104 to the on-screen display circuit 105.

The on-screen display circuit 105 superimposes the current time information from the clock circuit 104 on the video signal, and outputs the superimposed video signal to the video processing circuit 103.

When the microcontroller 106 is energized,
The current time information from the clock circuit 104 is stored in the nonvolatile memory 1
07. When the power is turned off, the nonvolatile memory 10
After the current time information is output to the internal clock 108, an initialization instruction is issued to the internal clock 108. When the power supply is started after the power is turned off, the time information immediately before the power is cut off from the nonvolatile memory 107 and the power-off time from the internal clock 108 are obtained, and the time information just before the power-off and the power cut-off are obtained. The current time is calculated by adding the time. Then, the calculated current time information is output to the clock circuit 104.

The nonvolatile memory 107 stores current time information from the microcontroller 106. And
When there is a request to obtain current time information from the microcontroller 106, the microcontroller 106
Output the latest time information.

The internal clock 108 starts measuring the power-off time based on an initialization command from the microcontroller 106. Then, when there is a request to acquire the power-off time from the microcontroller 106, the power-off time is output to the microcontroller 106.

In this embodiment, the internal clock 108 corresponds to a power-off time measuring means, and the microcontroller 10
6 corresponds to the control means, and the clock circuit 104 corresponds to the time holding means.

Next, a method for holding the current time information of the digital broadcast receiving apparatus configured as described above will be described.

First, the process at the time of energization will be described. Normally, the current time information is extracted from the broadcast signal and the clock circuit 1
04. The current time information held in the clock circuit 104 is stored in the nonvolatile memory 107 by the microcontroller 106 at regular intervals.

Next, the processing at the time of power-off will be described. When the power is turned off, the microcontroller 106
Stores the current time information immediately before power-off held in the clock circuit 104 in the nonvolatile memory 107, and then causes the internal clock 108 to start measuring the power-off time.

Finally, the processing when the power is supplied after the power is turned off will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. When power supply is started, the microcontroller 1
06 acquires the time information immediately before the power is turned off from the nonvolatile memory 107 (S201). At this time, if the time information immediately before the power is turned off cannot be obtained because the time information is not stored in the nonvolatile memory 107 (S2).
02), wait until the time information superimposed on the broadcast signal can be obtained (S207, NO in S208), and when the time information is obtained (YES in S208), the time information is sent to the clock circuit 104 as the current time information. The current time information from the normal broadcast signal to be stored is stored (S209).

On the other hand, if the time information immediately before the power shutdown is obtained (YES in S202), the process shifts to a process of obtaining the power shutdown time from the internal clock 108 (S203). In the power-off time acquisition process, if the power-off time cannot be obtained because the internal clock 108 is not operating (NO in S204), the process waits until the time information superimposed on the broadcast signal can be obtained (S207). When the time information is acquired (NO in S208), the time information is held in the clock circuit 104 as the current time information when the time information is acquired (YES in S208), and the current time information from a normal broadcast signal is held (S209).

On the other hand, if the power shutdown time can be obtained (YES in S204), the microcontroller 106
Calculates the current time by adding the time information immediately before power-off and the power-off time (S205). Then, the calculated current time information is stored in the clock circuit 104 (S20).
6). Here, if the time information actually superimposed on the broadcast signal can be obtained after the processing (S205, S206), (S205
(YES at 208), the method is switched to a method of holding current time information from a normal broadcast signal, in which the time information is held as current time information in the clock circuit 104 (S209).

As described above, in this embodiment, the time information superimposed on the broadcast signal is stored in the non-volatile memory 107, and the power-off time is measured by the internal clock 108 when the power is turned off. When the supply is started, the current time is obtained by adding the time information immediately before power-off from the nonvolatile memory 107 and the power-off time from the internal clock 108 until the current time information is obtained from the broadcast signal. By calculating, it is possible to always hold the current time information.

In this embodiment, the internal clock 108
However, the same effect can be obtained even if the power-off time is measured by a standby microcontroller which is a controller for reducing the power consumption of the digital broadcast receiving apparatus during standby.

(Embodiment 2) FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to a second embodiment of the present invention.

This embodiment is obtained by adding a reservation management method to the first embodiment. Since the current time information holding method is the same as that in the first embodiment, a detailed description is omitted.

The digital broadcast receiving apparatus shown in FIG. 3 includes a tuner circuit 101, a digital tuning circuit 102, a video processing circuit 103, a clock circuit 104, an on-screen display circuit 105, a microcontroller 106, and an internal clock 10
8, a nonvolatile memory 301, and a reservation management circuit 302.

A tuner circuit 101, a digital tuning circuit 102, a video processing circuit 103, and a clock circuit 10 shown in FIG.
4. Since the on-screen display circuit 105, the microcontroller 106, and the internal clock 108 have the same functions as the circuits denoted by the same reference numerals in FIG. 1, the description will be omitted, and only the features that are the features of the present embodiment will be described. I do.

The nonvolatile memory 301 stores current time information from the microcontroller 106 and reservation information input by the user using the remote control device. When there is a request to obtain the current time information from the microcontroller 106, the microcontroller 1
06, and outputs the latest time information to the reservation management circuit 30.
If there is a request to acquire the reservation information from 2, the reservation information is output to the reservation management circuit 302.

When the reservation management circuit 302 receives a notification from the microcontroller 106 that the reservation information is present at the time of energization, the non-volatile memory 3
01, the reservation information is obtained. Then, the clock circuit 104
When the time indicated by becomes the reservation time, an instruction to select a reserved program to the digital channel selection circuit 102 and an instruction to display a reservation start to the on-screen display circuit 105 are issued based on the acquired reservation information. Further, when the power supply is started after the power is turned off and a notification that the current time has been calculated is received from the microcontroller 106, the notification is used as a trigger to acquire the current time information from the clock circuit 104. And
The acquired current time information is compared with the reservation start time of the reservation information stored in advance, and if there is reservation information to be operated immediately after the power supply is started after the power is turned off, a digital signal is generated based on the reservation information. An instruction to select a reserved program to the tuning circuit 102 and an instruction to display a reservation start to the on-screen display circuit 105 are issued.

In this embodiment, the internal clock 108 corresponds to a power-off time measuring means, and the microcontroller 10
6 corresponds to the control means, the clock circuit 104 corresponds to the time holding means, and the reservation management circuit 302 corresponds to the reservation management means.

Next, a description will be given of a reservation management method for the digital broadcast receiving apparatus configured as described above.

First, the process at the time of energization will be described. The reservation information from the user is stored in the non-volatile memory 301 by the microcontroller 106, and is further held in the reservation management circuit 302.

Next, processing when power is supplied after power is cut off will be described. When the power supply is started, the current time information is held in the clock circuit 104 by the current time information holding method described in the first embodiment. At this time, the reservation management circuit 302 acquires the current time information from the clock circuit 104. Then, the obtained current time information is compared with the reservation start time of the reservation information held in advance in the reservation management circuit 302, and if there is reservation information to be operated immediately after the power supply is started after the power is turned off, Start the reservation operation immediately.

As described above, in the present embodiment, the reservation information from the user is stored in the nonvolatile memory 301, and when the power supply is started after the power is turned off, the nonvolatile memory 30
By comparing the current time information calculated by adding the time information immediately before power-off from 1 and the power-off time from the internal clock 108 with the reservation start time of the reservation information,
The reservation immediately after the power supply is started after the power is turned off can be started without delay.

In this embodiment, the internal clock 108
In the same manner as in the first embodiment, the power off time is measured by the standby microcontroller which is a controller for reducing the power consumption of the digital broadcast receiver during standby. The effect of can be obtained.

[0044]

As described above, according to the present invention,
The time information superimposed on the broadcast signal and the reservation information from the user are stored in a non-volatile memory, and the power-off time is measured by an internal clock when the power is turned off. Until the time of acquisition, the current time is always on-screen by obtaining the current time from the time information just before power off stored in the non-volatile memory and the power off time measured by the internal clock, and keeping the time information constantly. This can be displayed or the reservation operation immediately after the power is turned on again can be guaranteed.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing a procedure for holding current time information when power supply is started after power is turned off.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to a second embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 Reference Signs List 101 Tuner circuit 102 Digital tuning circuit 103 Video processing circuit 104 Clock circuit 105 On-screen display circuit 106 Microcontroller 107, 301 Non-volatile memory 108 Internal clock 302 Reservation management circuit

──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continued on the front page (51) Int.Cl. ⁷ Identification symbol FI Theme coat ゛ (Reference) H04N 5/445 H04N 5/445 Z 5K061 5/63 5/63 Z 7/08 7/08 Z 7/081 F term (reference) 2F002 AA07 AD06 AD07 AE00 DA00 FA16 FA31 GA08 GC22 2F085 AA04 BB00 CC10 EE08 FF04 GG12 GG23 5C025 AA23 BA18 BA25 BA27 BA28 BA30 CA09 CB06 DA01 5C026 EA07 5C063 AB03 AB05 DA20 5

Claims (3)

[Claims] A nonvolatile memory for storing time information;
Power-off time measuring means for measuring the power-off time from when the power is turned off until power supply is started, time holding means for holding current time information, and the non-volatile memory,
Control means for controlling the operation of a power-off time measuring means and a time holding means, wherein the control means stores time information superimposed on a broadcast signal in the nonvolatile memory, and when the power is cut off, When the power-off time is started by the power-off time measuring means, and when the power supply is started after the power-off, the time information immediately before the power-off is read from the nonvolatile memory and the power supply from the power-off time measuring means is read. A digital broadcast receiving apparatus which reads a cutoff time, adds the read time information and a power cutoff time, and stores the calculated time information as current time information in the time holding means. 2. The non-volatile memory further stores reservation information, and further includes a reservation management unit that manages a reservation operation based on the reservation information stored in the non-volatile memory. Item 2. The digital broadcast receiving device according to Item 1. 3. The digital broadcast receiving apparatus according to claim 1, wherein a standby microcontroller is used as a power-off time measuring means.