JP4525357B2 - Audio data recording / reproducing device - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention is an audio data recording / reproducing device having an external storage device such as a hard disk device (HDD), and is connected to an external personal computer (PC) via an interface such as a USB, and the PC The present invention relates to a device that can directly access an external storage device.

  Conventionally, various types of devices are known as digital multitrack recorders (hard disk recorders) incorporating external storage devices such as HDDs. As is well known, in a hard disk recorder, an analog signal (recording input) based on music performance or the like is converted into a digital signal and recorded in a built-in hard disk device, or a digital signal input to a predetermined plurality of channels is recorded on the HDD. Can be recorded. The digital signal (sound data) recorded in the HDD is managed by a song file including song management data for each song (unit of music to be recorded and reproduced; for example, one song = one music). Each song is composed of a plurality of tracks, and when recording / playing back a song, the plurality of tracks can be recorded / played back simultaneously, and further, recorded and played back simultaneously on a plurality of tracks. The user can perform non-destructive editing such as cut, copy, paste, and move on the signal recorded on each track in the HDD.

  Conventionally, a USB (Universal Serial Bus) standard interface is known as one of the interfaces for externally connecting peripheral devices to a personal computer. Via the USB interface, various types of external storage devices (storage devices) such as hard disk devices, CD drives, and FDD (floppy (trademark) disk drives), digital audio devices, digital image input devices, etc. USB compatible devices can be connected. An operating system OS on the PC can control an external device connected via the USB.

  In this specification, a hard disk recorder (audio data recording / reproducing device) is connected to a PC via a USB interface so that the recorder is recognized as an external storage device of the PC from the OS on the connected PC. The function to become is called “USB storage function”. According to the “USB storage function”, a PC connected to the hard disk recorder via USB can directly access the HDD built in the hard disk recorder.

In a conventionally known hard disk recorder (audio data recording / reproducing device) that does not have the USB storage function, a unique file system is built in the built-in hard disk device, and a song file or the like is created according to the unique file system. Thus, the built-in HDD cannot be directly accessed from an external personal computer (see, for example, Patent Document 1 below).
JP 2001-216765 A

  On the other hand, in a model having a USB storage function, a file system compatible with a PC is built in the built-in HDD, and various data are stored as files compatible with the PC. In the hard disk recorder, the operation mode can be switched between “normal mode” that does not use the USB storage function and “USB storage mode” that uses the USB storage function. The hard disk recorder is recognized as an external storage device of the PC from an external PC, and the PC can directly access the HDD built in the hard disk recorder.

Incidentally, the data stored in the HDD of the hard disk recorder includes data files essential for the operation of the hard disk recorder, such as the operation program of the recorder, in addition to the song file and the like.
In the conventional hard disk recorder, when the USB storage function is used, all the files stored on the HDD file system become visible from the PC. However, the file stored on the HDD cannot be protected against operations from the PC. For this reason, there is a risk that the user accidentally deletes a file essential for the operation of the hard disk recorder, such as an operation program stored on the HDD, by an operation on the PC.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above points. In an audio data recording / reproducing apparatus having a function of operating as a network storage class of a PC connected via a predetermined interface (for example, a USB interface), the recording / reproducing is performed. The object is to prevent access to data to be protected on the hard disk of the apparatus from an external PC.

  The present invention is an audio data recording / reproducing apparatus connected to an external personal computer via a predetermined interface, an operation panel, and a storage device which can be addressed in units of sectors, A storage device having a non-protected area managed by a compatible file system and a protected area that is not managed, and a sector unit address is directly specified at power-on, and protected data is transferred from the protected area. A protection area reading means to read, a control means for controlling the operation of the recording / reproducing apparatus based on the read protected data, a means for designating one of a normal mode and a storage mode, and the file in the normal mode. Under system management, depending on the operation of the operation panel, Recording / reproducing means for writing data to the non-protected area as a waveform file or reading from the waveform file; and in the storage mode, an access command from the personal computer is accepted and the computer is managed with the file system. Access receiving means for accessing the area as external storage means of the computer is provided.

  In the recording / reproducing apparatus according to the present invention, in the storage mode, the accepting unit records in the unprotected area under the management of the file system in accordance with a read command or a write command from the personal computer. The apparatus further comprises means for reading or writing the file being read. In the recording / reproducing apparatus according to the present invention, the protect data includes status data indicating an operating state of the recording / reproducing apparatus, and the recording / reproducing apparatus further performs the operation at the time when the power is turned off. State data indicating the state includes the protection area writing means by addressing in units of sectors. The storage device is a hard disk device having one or more magnetic disks for storing data by a zone bit recording method, and the protection area is set on the inner peripheral side of the magnetic disk. It may be.

  According to the present invention, in the storage device, a protected area that cannot be recognized by the personal computer is provided, and an area other than the protected area (unprotected area) is formatted with a file system that can be recognized by the personal computer. Since the protected area is not formatted with a file system recognizable by the personal computer, a personal computer connected to the recording / reproducing apparatus via a predetermined interface (for example, USB interface) cannot access the protected area. In this protection area, data to be protected (protect data) such as data essential for the operation of the system such as an operation program of the recording / reproducing apparatus is stored, so that the data is surely protected from erroneous operation on the PC. There is an excellent effect of being able to.

  An embodiment in which the present invention is applied to a digital multi-track recorder (hard disk recorder) equipped with an HDD will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

  FIG. 1 is a block diagram schematically showing the overall configuration of a hard disk recorder (HDR) configured as an audio recording / reproducing apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention. As shown in the figure, the hard disk recorder includes a CPU 1, a flash memory 2, a RAM 3, a transfer unit 4, a buffer memory 5, a mixer unit (DSP) 6, an operator 7, an electric fader 8, a display 9, an IDE interface (IDE). I / O) 10 and PC input / output interface (PC I / O) 11 are connected to each other via a data and communication bus 1B. A hard disk device (HDD) 20 and a CD-RW drive 21 are connected to the HDR via the IDE interface 10. In the example shown in the drawing, the IDE standard is shown as an example of the hard disk interface, but this may be an interface of another standard such as serial ATA.

The CPU 1 performs overall control of the recorder based on the operation program of the hard disk recorder. Specifically, the CPU 1 outputs commands to the transfer unit 4, the mixer unit (DSP) 6, and the IDE interface 10, and uses the HDD 20 to control song recording (recording), playback control, mixing control, Based on the operation information of the operation element 7 and the electric fader 8, the editing of the song, the track or the region or the waveform editing control, the motor drive control of the electric fader 8, the display control of the display 9 and the like are performed. With the drive control of the electric fader 8, the operation position of the fader 8 follows the progress of music in real time, and the fader instantaneously moves to a predetermined set position. The display 9 is composed of an LCD or the like. The display 9 may display a recording / playback operation screen, an editing operation screen, various parameter setting states, a list of songs stored in the HDD 20, and the like.
Specifically, the operation program is an operating system (OS) and a processing program for each task such as UI processing, DSP control processing, recorder control processing, and automix processing that operates on the OS. The operation program is stored in the HDD 20 and transferred to the RAM 3 when the hard disk recorder is powered on. The flash memory 2 contains a boot loader program for booting the operation program of the HDD 20, and the operation program is transferred from the HDD 20 to the RAM 3 when the program is to be executed (for example, when the recorder is turned on). It is like that. The flash memory 2 is also used for holding various data.

  The PC input / output interface (PC I / O) 11 is an interface including a USB (Universal Serial Bus) standard interface and the like. The hard disk recorder is connected to an external PC 50 via the PC I / O 11, and can exchange data with the external PC 50. In the hard disk recorder, the operation mode can be switched between a “normal mode” that does not use the USB storage function and a “USB storage mode” that uses the USB storage function. In the USB storage mode, the hard disk recorder is recognized as an external storage device of the PC 50 from an external PC 50 connected by USB, and the external PC 50 is connected to the HDD 20 via the IDE interface 10 in the hard disk recorder. And the CD-RW drive 21 can be directly accessed.

  The mixer section (DSP) 6 includes an analog input / output interface (in the figure, waveform input / waveform output) including an AD converter and a DA converter, a signal input / output interface 12 including a digital interface, an analog / digital conversion card, An input / output slot to which an option card such as a digital / analog conversion card or a digital I / O card can be connected is provided. In accordance with an instruction from the CPU 1, the mixer unit 6 performs signal processing for each input and a plurality of digital signals input from the transfer unit 4 for each predetermined sample period, or selectively mixes the plurality of digital signals. The mixing process is performed, and a signal resulting from the mixing process is output to the corresponding output destination and transfer unit 4. In the following description, names such as “sample data”, “sound data”, and “waveform data” may be used to refer to the digital signal.

  The HDD 20 stores data essential to the operation of the recorder, such as the operation program of the hard disk recorder, in addition to a song file including recorded song management data for each song, recorded sound data, and the like. As will be described in detail later, in the HDD 20 according to this embodiment, by providing an area for creating a file system compatible with the PC 50 and a protection area for not creating the file system, the protection stored in the protection area is provided. Data to be accessed cannot be accessed from the external PC 50 even in the USB storage mode.

The transfer unit 4 performs transfer between the hard disk 20 and the buffer memory 5 and transfer between the buffer memory 5 and the mixer unit (DSP) 6 in accordance with an instruction from the CPU 1. For example, when recording for one track, data for one sample of the track (sample data) is received from the mixer unit 6 and written into the buffer memory 5 at each sampling period. When samples for one cluster are accumulated in the buffer memory 5, the sample data for one cluster is transferred to the track storage area of the HDD 20. During this transfer operation, the process of receiving one sample of data from the mixer unit 6 and writing it into the buffer memory 5 is continued. As a result, the sound data to be recorded is stored as the data of the track on the HDD 20.
In addition, when performing reproduction for one track, the transfer unit 4 reads sample data for two or more clusters at the head of the track from the HDD 20 and writes the sample data in the buffer memory 5. Then, for each sampling period, one sample is read from the buffer memory 5, and the read data for one sample is transferred to the mixer unit 6. When an empty area for one cluster (storage area for sample data that has been reproduced) is created in the buffer memory 5, the subsequent sample data for one cluster is transferred from the HDD 20 to the empty area, and processing similar to the above is performed. repeat.

2A and 2B are schematic views for explaining the configuration of the hard disk device 20. FIG. 2A is a perspective view of a magnetic disk (platter) portion of the HDD 20 as viewed from obliquely above, and FIG. FIG. 5C is a view of the (platter) as viewed from above, and FIG. 9C is a view of the magnetic disk portion as viewed from the side. As shown in (a) and (c), the HDD 20 has a plurality (four in this figure) of magnetic disks 21 to 24 arranged on the same axis, and corresponds to each surface of each of the disks 21 to 24. A magnetic head 25 for reading and writing data is provided, and each surface of each of the disks 21 to 24 serves as a storage surface. In FIG. 3C, identifiers 0 to 7 are given to the heads corresponding to the respective surfaces of the disks 21 to 24, and the distinction is illustrated. In the figure, for convenience of illustration, only the head of “identifier 0” corresponding to one side of the disk 21 is given a reference numeral 25 to represent the other. As is well known, in a hard disk drive, a concentric area drawn when the magnetic disks 21 to 24 are rotated with the magnetic head 25 fixed is a data recording area called a “track” 26. Each track 26 at the same radial position on each storage surface is collectively referred to as a “cylinder” 27. An area called “sector” 28 obtained by dividing the track 26 radially from the center of the magnetic disk (that is, in the circumferential direction of the disk) is the smallest storage unit (see FIG. 2B). 2B, the numbers 0, 1, 2, 3, 4... Shown on the outer periphery of the disk 21 exemplify the distinction of each sector per track.
In conventional HDDs and FDs (floppy (trademark)), the same number of sectors 28 are created radially with respect to the magnetic disk (see FIG. 2C), and data is read and written by rotating the magnetic disk at a constant speed. However, in this method, the data recording density is lowered on the outer peripheral side of the magnetic disk, which causes great waste. In recent HDDs and high-density disks, in order to increase the storage capacity by using the same medium as efficiently as possible, a recording method in which the number of sectors is gradually increased toward the outer circumference: “zone bit recording method (ZBR / Zone Bit) Recordings) ”. In the track format of the ZBR system, a plurality of tracks arranged concentrically on each magnetic disk are divided into several areas (zones) for each fixed radius, and the number of sectors per track in each zone is fixed. Generally, the number of sectors per track is increased in the outer zone. At the time of recording, the bit size is adjusted to be constant by changing the recording frequency of the head for the disk rotating at a constant speed. Since the number of revolutions of the disk is constant, the outer periphery has a larger amount of data stored per rotation than the inner periphery, and data reading / writing is faster. FIG. 2D is a top view of the magnetic disk conceptually showing the track format according to the ZBR system. In the figure, three zones are set as one zone, and three zones 29a to 29c are set.

  Note that the track format HDD shown in FIG. 2D performs access to data by an addressing method called an LBA (Logical Block Addressing) method. In the LBA method, numbers are assigned in order from 0 to each sector in the disk, which is used as address information, and data can be accessed by specifying the sector. In the address information, the outer periphery of the disk is the head and the inner periphery is the tail. In addition, in the conventional addressing method using the CHS (Cylinder: Cylinder, Head: Head, Sector: Sector) method, one corresponding sector is specified using the three parameters of the cylinder, head, and sector as address information. Yes.

  3A and 3B show a data map of the HDD 20 according to this embodiment. As shown in FIGS. 2A and 2B, a protection area 40 having a fixed capacity is provided in the area on the tail side (inner disk side) of the sector address on the HDD 20. This protected area 40 is an area where a partition is not cut and a file system is not created. Therefore, since the PC 50 connected to the recorder via USB cannot recognize the protected area 40 as an external storage device, the data recorded in the protected area 30 can be protected. The protection area 30 stores data (protect data) to be protected from an erroneous user operation on the PC 50 such as an operation program of the hard disk recorder.

  A plurality of appropriate partitions 41 and 42 (“partition 1” and “partition 2” in FIG. 5A) are cut off in areas other than the protected area 40 (non-protected areas), respectively, It is formatted with a compatible file system (for example, FAT32, FAT16, NTFS, etc.). When the operation mode of the hard disk recorder main body is set to “USB storage mode”, the unprotected areas 41 and 42 of the HDD 20 from the PC 50 connected to the main body by USB are used as USB storage (external storage means of the PC). As a result, the PC 50 can directly access the unprotected areas 41 and 42. That is, in the USB storage mode, the hard disk recorder main body receives a read command or a write command from the external PC 50, and manages a file system compatible with the PC 50 according to the read command or the write command, The file recorded in the unprotected areas 41 and 42 can be read or written. In the areas 41 and 42, various files such as a song file constituting each song, a plurality of waveform files (a song configuration will be described later), and various setting data files are recorded. When the ZBR track format is adopted, the data reading speed becomes faster toward the outer peripheral side. Therefore, as shown in FIGS. 3A and 3B, the protected area 40 is provided on the inner peripheral side, and the non-protected areas 41 and 42 used for song storage and the like are provided on the outer peripheral side. Since the slow inner peripheral area is not used, there is an advantage that the minimum guaranteed specification of the hard disk recorder can be raised. Further, the writing destination of song files and plural waveform files (described later) constituting each song is limited to any one partition of the HDD 20, and the range in which the head of the HDD 20 moves during song recording / playback is set. By limiting it to one partition, the average head moving time when accessing the HDD 20 is shortened.

  The setting of the protection area 40 in the HDD 20 is performed at the time of factory shipment. That is, at the time of factory shipment, the predetermined capacity at the end of the sector address is set as the protection area 40, and data to be protected is written into the protection area 40. In addition, in the area other than the protection area 40, partitions (partitions 1 and 2 in FIG. 3) are created and the disk is formatted. In other words, a protected area that cannot be accessed from the PC 50 is created by formatting the other areas with a file system compatible with the PC 50 while leaving a predetermined capacity at the end of the sector address. Note that either the data writing process to the protected area at the time of shipment from the factory or the partition creation and formatting process in other areas may be performed first.

  As data to be stored in the protection area 40, that is, data to be protected, for example, an operation program of the hard disk recorder, data indicating the last state at the time of previous use, electric fader position calibration data, or CD -Template data for writing data in the RW drive 30, or other data for customer service, for example, past service history, operation log (user operation history), operation log (for example, cumulative HDD operation time) Data). Note that it is not always necessary to protect all of the above data, and any one to a combination of any number of these data can be data to be protected.

  Specifically, the operation program of the hard disk recorder includes an operating system (OS) and a system operation such as a processing program for each task such as UI processing, DSP control processing, recorder control processing, and automix processing that operates on the OS. It is essential data. As described above, the flash memory 2 contains a boot loader program for booting the operation program of the HDD 20, and the operation program is transferred from the HDD 20 to the RAM 3 by the boot loader. FIG. 4A is a flowchart showing an example of a procedure for starting the operating system of the recorder main body based on the operation program by the boot loader, which is started when the recorder is turned on, for example. As shown in FIG. 4A, the recorder main body directly designates a sector by an address designation method such as an LBA method, for example, and stores operation program data from the protection area 40 (see FIG. 3) in the RAM 3 (FIG. 1). Reference) Read, check the data of the read operation program, and if there is an error, it may be dealt with as appropriate (step S2). For example, if the same operation program is stored in the protection area 40 and there is an error in the read data, the other normal data may be used or the error may be repaired with the normal data. . In step S3, the OS read into the RAM 3 is activated, and each process data operating on the OS is read.

  Data indicating the last state at the time of previous use is written into the protection area 40 by a shutdown process that is started when the power of the recorder body is turned off, for example. At the time of shutdown, each currently running processing program is stopped, and the current status of the recorder is stored in the protection area 40 (see FIG. 3) as data indicating the last state at the previous use, for example, an addressing method such as the LBA method. Write a sector by direct specification. Thereafter, the OS is stopped and the power of the recorder is turned off. The current status written in the protection area 40 as data indicating the last state at the time of the previous use is, for example, the display screen, the position of the cursor, the name of the song file that has been read, the operation of the transfer unit 4, the mixer unit 6, etc. This data includes various setting data such as data, dynamic characteristic control data by automatic dynamic characteristic correction of the electric fader 8, and the like. Steps S4 to S6 shown in the flowchart of FIG. 4B are an example of the procedure of the shutdown process.

  The electric fader position calibration data is data created when position calibration (fader calibration processing) of the electric fader 8 is performed at the time of factory shipment, repair of the electric fader 8, or the like. FIG. 4C is a flowchart illustrating an example of a fader calibration process procedure. This process is a process performed by a service person at the time of factory shipment or repair of the electric fader 8, and is started by inputting a specific command. When the fader calibration process is started, an instruction indicating a predetermined operation position of the fader is issued in step SS7. Therefore, the serviceman moves the fader knob to the predetermined position by hand to acquire the position data. This obtains position data at a plurality of positions for each fader. In step S8, calibration data is created based on the position data acquired in step S7. In step S9, the created calibration data is stored in the protection area 40 (see FIG. 3) as a sector by an addressing method such as the LBA method. Is written directly.

  That is, the hard disk recorder main body reads and writes data in the protected area 40 of the HDD 20 by direct designation of sectors (see steps S1, S5 and S9 in FIGS. 4A to 4C). Further, a write process by direct sector designation may be performed for version upgrade of the operation program. In this case, the upgrade program supplied from the manufacturer may include a new operation program to be written to the protection area and a write routine for executing the write, and only the new operation program is stored in the upgrade program. Then, the write to the protection area may be performed by the write routine in the boot loader described above.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing an example of a procedure for formatting the HDD 20 in the recorder main body. This process is activated in response to a format instruction from the user. FIG. 6A is a display screen showing an example of a format screen on which the user issues a format instruction on the display of the PC 50 connected to the recorder main body by USB. When accepting the format instruction from the screen, set the operation mode (whether the USB storage mode is turned on or returned to the normal operation mode) on the USB storage mode confirmation screen as shown in FIG. You should do it. In the format screen of FIG. 6A, the user selects the cluster size (either “32 kbit” or “64 kbit” in the example in the figure) and the number of partitions to be created (in the example in the figure, 2, 3). Or four) and a format execution instruction. The “cluster” is a storage unit in which a plurality of sectors are collected.
When a format instruction event occurs in response to a format execution instruction from the user, as shown in FIG. 5, the capacity of the HDD 20 is checked in step S10. If there is no problem with the size of the HDD 20 (YES in step S11), step S12 is performed. In FIG. 6B, the predetermined area at the end of the sector address of the HDD 20 is left as the protection area 40, and all existing partitions are canceled in the other areas, and a plurality of partitions corresponding to the selection on the screen (FIG. 6A) are made. create. The size of the created partition is obtained by subtracting the capacity (fixed amount) of the protection area from the total capacity of the HDD 20 and dividing it by the number of partitions specified by the user. In step S12, since the predetermined area at the end of the sector address of the HDD 20 is left as the protection area 40, the protection area 40 is not formatted. Then, the cluster size corresponding to the selection on the screen (FIG. 6A) is written, and in step S13, the created partitions are logically formatted. On the other hand, as a result of the capacity check of the HDD 20, if there is any problem (eg, if the HDD is not connected or not connected) (NO in step S11), HDD capacity error processing is performed in step S14. The formatting process ends. In the above example, the user selects the number of partitions. However, this may be fixed, or the number of partitions may be automatically determined based on the capacity of the HDD 20. Good.

  FIG. 7 is a flowchart showing an example of a procedure for writing a new song in the partition created by the formatting process. In response to the occurrence of a new song write event, the free capacity of each partition is checked (step S15), and the partition with the largest free capacity is selected as the partition into which the new song is written (step S16). If the free space of the selected partition is less than the predetermined amount (NO in step S17), the new song writing process is terminated by the free space shortage error process in step S20. On the other hand, if the free space of the selected partition is greater than or equal to the predetermined amount (YES in step S17), a folder for the new song is created (step S18), and a song file for the new song is written (step S19). .

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing various folders of one song and various file configuration examples in the folder according to this embodiment. A song folder 50 corresponding to one song is composed of one song file 51, an audio waveform folder (Audio folder) 52, and a render file folder (Render folder) 53. The same folder name as the name of the file 51 is given. The song file 51 includes data for managing a chain of temporal recording positions of sound data for each recording of each track, sequential management data regarding a mixing function, and the like, and is stored in an extension “.aws” format. . Each track constituting the song has a plurality of virtual tracks, and each virtual track is composed of a sequence of a plurality of regions. Note that the song file 51 in which the song protect function is set to ON is given a non-writeable (ReadOnly) attribute. In the Audio folder 52, sound data of each recording of each track of the song is stored as a waveform file 54 (file with extension “.wav” format). In the song folder structure according to this embodiment, since the sound data in the Audio folder 52 is stored as a waveform file, the sound data (waveform file) can be directly edited from the external PC 50 connected to the hard disk recorder via USB. it can. Each waveform file 54 has a waveform recorded at which take in which track from each name (numbers 0, 1, 2, 3... In front of the extension “.wav” in the figure). The file is specified. At the time of track reproduction, each region in each virtual track of the song file 51 designates a corresponding waveform file 54 as sound data to be reproduced. Also, the Render folder 53 stores a file (file with extension “.wav” format: called “render file”) 55 for reproducing the region connection part (cluster connection) so as not to fail. Has been. When reproducing sound data, if the data read from the HDD 20 to the buffer memory 5 in a cluster unit is small, the sound data reproduction time is shortened. Therefore, depending on the HDD speed and CPU processing capacity, There is a risk that the reproduction of the sound data becomes unstable. In this regard, when the read data is less than a predetermined amount (for example, 50% of the cluster), processing for creating a reproduction cluster is performed. The reproduction cluster is stored in the Render folder 53 as a render file 55. This render file (playback cluster) 55 cannot be directly edited from the external PC 50.
The songs having the folder structure described above are written in the unprotected areas 41 and 42 of the HDD 20. In this embodiment, since the sound data is recorded in the waveform file format, the PC 50 connected to the recorder main body by USB can directly edit the waveform file on the HDD 20. For details of the virtual track and the reproduction cluster, refer to, for example, the description of Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-124022.

In the above-described embodiment, the LBA method is exemplified as the addressing method when data is read / written in the protected area 40 of the HDD 20, but the present invention is not limited to this, and any method can be used as long as the method directly specifies the sector. A simple addressing scheme may be used. Moreover, although the example which provides the protection area 40 in the inner peripheral side of HDD20 was demonstrated in the said Example, the setting position of the protection area 40 is not limited to this. Further, the type of data (data to be protected) to be written in the protection area 40 is not limited to the above. In addition, although the USB interface is illustrated as an example of the PC input / output interface (PC I / O) 11, the PC I / O is not limited to the USB standard, but is referred to in this specification such as Ethernet, wireless LAN, and IEEE1394. However, any interface that can implement the “storage function” can be applied to the present invention.
In the above embodiment, the digital multi-track recorder (hard disk recorder) is a device having a mixing function, but any recording / reproducing device having a built-in HDD and a function of using the HDD as a USB storage device can be used. The present invention may be applied to a hard disk recorder that does not have a mixing function, other audio data recording / reproducing apparatuses, and the like.

  As described above, according to this embodiment, of the total size of the hard disk device, an area other than a predetermined fixed amount of the protected area is formatted with a file system compatible with the PC, and is formatted with the file system. Even when the hard disk device is used as a USB storage by writing the data to be protected in the unprotected area, the external PC cannot access the protected area. Therefore, in a hard disk recorder (audio data recording / reproducing device) having a USB storage function, data to be protected on the hard disk of the recorder cannot be accessed from an external PC, and the data recorded in the protected area can be surely stored. It has an excellent effect that it can be protected.

The block diagram which shows the hardware constitutions of the recording / reproducing apparatus (hard disk recorder) which concerns on one Example of this invention. FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram illustrating a configuration of the hard disk device according to the embodiment, where (a) is a perspective view, (b) is a view from above, (c) is a side view, and (d) is a ZBR system. FIG. 2 is a top view of a magnetic disk conceptually showing a track format according to FIG. (A) And (b) is a figure which shows the data map of the hard-disk apparatus based on the Example. (A) is a flowchart showing an example of a procedure for starting an OS based on the operation program by a boot loader, (b) is a flowchart showing an example of a procedure for shutdown processing, and (c) is an example of a procedure for electric fader position calibration processing. The flowchart shown. The flowchart which shows an example of the procedure of the formatting process of HDD in the recorder main body which concerns on the Example. (A) is an example of a display screen for instructing execution of the formatting process shown in FIG. 5, and (b) is an example of an operation mode confirmation screen displayed when the formatting process is executed. 6 is a flowchart showing an example of a procedure for writing a new song according to the embodiment. The figure which shows the example of a structure of the various folders of the song which concern on the Example, and the various files in the folder

Explanation of symbols

1 CPU, 2 Flash memory, 3 RAM, 4 Transfer section, 5 Buffer memory, 6 Mixer section, 7 Operator, 8 Electric fader, 9 Display, 10 IDE interface, 11 PC input / output interface, 12 Signal input / output interface, 20 hard disk drive, 30 CD-RW drive, 50 PC, 21-24 platter, 25 magnetic head, 26 tracks, 27 cylinders, 28 sectors, 40 protected area, 41, 42 non-protected area (partition)

Claims (4)

An audio data recording / reproducing apparatus connected to an external personal computer via a predetermined interface,
An operation panel;
A storage device that can be addressed in units of sectors, the storage device having a non-protected area managed by a file system compatible with the personal computer, and a protected area that is not managed by the same;
A protection area reading means for directly specifying a sector unit address at power-on and reading the protection data from the protection area;
Control means for controlling the operation of the recording / reproducing apparatus based on the read protect data;
Means for specifying either the normal mode or the storage mode;
In the normal mode, under the management of the file system, according to the operation of the operation panel, the audio data is written in the non-protected area as a waveform file or read from the waveform file; and
In the storage mode, a recording apparatus comprising: an access receiving unit that receives an access command from the personal computer and causes the computer to access an unprotected area managed by the file system as an external storage unit of the computer. Playback device.   In the storage mode, the accepting means reads or writes a file recorded in the unprotected area under the management of the file system in response to a read command or write command from the personal computer. The recording / reproducing apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising:   The protect data includes state data indicating the operating state of the recording / reproducing apparatus. The recording / reproducing apparatus further specifies the state data indicating the operating state at the time when the power is turned off by addressing the sector unit. The recording / reproducing apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising the protection area writing unit. The storage device is a hard disk device having one or more magnetic disks for storing data by a zone bit recording method,
4. The recording / reproducing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the protection area is set on an inner peripheral side of the magnetic disk.

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