JPH0998226A - Cable telephone terminal equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To set a sound volume on the emergency broadcast in advance by setting data corresponding to a sound volume set by a sound volume adjustment knob in advance and storing the data. SOLUTION: Control data representing an emergency broadcast are fed to a microcomputer 56 via an input terminal 63 from the CPU of a cable telephone terminal equipment on the occurrence of an emergency broadcast. Then the microcomputer 56 controls an electronic volume 58 based on data stored in a nonvolatile memory 62 and the emergency broadcast is reproduced in a sound volume required on the occurrence of the emergency broadcast. Thus, the sound volume on the occurrence of the emergency broadcast is set in advance by turning on a sound volume setting switch 61 and the voice is sounded in the preset sound volume on the occurrence of the emergency broadcast. It is prevented that the emergency broadcast is overheard and the content of the emergency broadcast is surely reported to each subscriber and then the terminal equipment is more suitable for the practical use.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a bidirectional communication system using a coaxial cable, an optical fiber cable or the like as a transmission line, and particularly to a CATV (Cable Televisi).
The present invention relates to a cable telephone terminal device used in a cable telephone system that provides telephone service using a network of a broadcasting system.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As is well known, in a wired two-way communication system such as the one mentioned above, delay control and TDMA (Ti
It is under consideration to provide a two-way communication service in combination with a me Division Multiple Access (time division multiple access) method. As an example of such a two-way communication service, a cable telephone system that provides a telephone service by using a network of the CATV broadcasting system is now attracting attention.

That is, this cable telephone system is designed to form a new telephone line network by using the network of the CATV broadcasting system without using the conventional telephone line network. In the future, it is expected that it will be possible to broaden the area by connecting to the public network. In addition, since this cable telephone system can be applied as an access means for interactive services such as VOD (Video On Demand), which is regarded as the most promising next-generation CATV broadcasting system, communication on the CATV broadcasting system is possible. It is considered to be indispensable as a foundation.

In short, the cable telephone system using the network of the CATV broadcasting system is not only expected to be developed as a telephone function but also can be used as a communication means for operating the CATV broadcasting system. However, it is expected to be put to practical use because it will produce great effects in various respects. By the way, in such an excellent cable telephone system, what is next desired is to make various improvements in detail so as to be more practically applicable from the viewpoints of configuration, operation and economy. It is said to be given.

[0005]

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION Problems to be Solved by the Invention
In the cable telephone system that uses the network of the V broadcasting system, various improvements will be made in detail in order to make it more practical from the viewpoints of configuration, operation and economics. Has become a major issue.

Therefore, the present invention has been made in consideration of the above circumstances. In announcement broadcasting, which is one of the services of the cable telephone system, the volume for emergency broadcasting is preset in addition to that for normal broadcasting. It is an object of the present invention to provide an extremely good cable telephone terminal device that is capable of performing the above-mentioned operations and can be more suitable for practical use.

[0007]

A cable telephone terminal device according to the present invention is used in a cable telephone system utilizing a network of a cable type two-way broadcasting system,
It is intended for those who receive audio announcement broadcasts and reproduce audio. Then, a volume adjusting operator for adjusting the volume at the time of voice reproduction, a storage means for storing data corresponding to the volume set by the volume adjusting operator, and a storage means for storing the emergency voice announcement broadcast. And a control means for performing voice reproduction at a volume based on the data.

According to the above configuration, the data corresponding to the volume set by the volume adjusting operator is preset and stored, and the preset volume is set at the time of the emergency voice announcement broadcast. I made it so that the voice announcement will be made.
It is possible to prevent the emergency broadcast from being overlooked, and to ensure that the contents of the emergency broadcast are distributed to each subscriber, which makes it even more suitable for practical use.

[0009]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. First, FIG. 1 shows an outline of a CATV broadcasting system to which a cable telephone system is applied. That is, in FIG.
BS (Broadcasting Satelli)
te) and CS (Communications Satellite) antennas 12 are installed.

The plurality of satellite broadcast signals received by the antenna 12 are supplied to a tuner 13 to select a desired satellite broadcast signal, and then a modulation circuit 14 performs a predetermined modulation process. In addition, in this CATV broadcasting center 11,
An antenna 15 for terrestrial waves is installed. The plurality of terrestrial broadcast signals received by the antenna 15 are supplied to a tuner 16 to select a desired terrestrial broadcast signal, and then a modulation circuit 17 performs a predetermined modulation process.

A satellite broadcasting processing system including the antenna 12, the tuner 13 and the modulation circuit 14 and a terrestrial broadcasting processing system including the antenna 15, tuner 16 and the modulation circuit 17 are provided in a plurality of systems (in FIG. 1, respectively). In each case, only one system is shown).

The satellite broadcast signal and the terrestrial broadcast signal output from the modulation circuits 14 and 17 are supplied to the mixing / branching circuit 18 and mixed, and then output to the network. This network uses a plurality of optical fiber hybrid transmission lines 19 that are used when the transmission distance is long, that is, an optical fiber cable is used partway through and a coaxial cable is used at the end. ) Subscriber terminal 20 is connected.

The CATV broadcasting center 11 has a PBX (Private Branch Exchange) device 21 for performing exchange control for a telephone service with a public network outside the CATV broadcasting center 11.
Is provided. Further, the CATV broadcasting center 11 is provided with a demand assign control circuit 22 having a delay control function for the subscriber terminal 20 and an interface function for the PBX device 21.

The demand assignment control circuit 22
In order to realize an interface function for the PBX device 21, the PCM (Pu
lseCode Modulation) Connected via a highway.

Here, the above demand assignment control circuit 2
The plurality of downlink data output from 2 are the plurality of TDMA.
The signals are supplied to the control circuits 231, ..., 23n and converted into frame units having a bit rate adapted to the communication specifications. Then, the plurality of TDMA control devices 231,
.., 23n are supplied to the digital modulation / demodulation circuits 241 ,.

In this way, the downlink modulation data output from the plurality of digital modulation / demodulation circuits 241, ..., 24n is supplied to the mixing / branching circuit 18 and mixed, and thereafter,
It is output to the network as a downlink signal.

The upstream signal transmitted from the subscriber terminal 20 passes through the transmission line 19 and the mixing / branching circuit 18, and then a plurality of digital modulation / demodulation circuits 241, ..., 24.
n and is demodulated to be converted into upstream data, and thereafter, the TDMA control device 231 ,.
23n, the demand assignment control device 22 and the PBX device 21 to the public network.

On the other hand, in the subscriber terminal 20, after receiving the satellite broadcasting signal and the terrestrial broadcasting signal coming through the transmission line 19 at the CATV home terminal 25 and performing the channel selection processing and the demodulation processing, It is being reproduced on the television receiver 26.

Further, the downlink signal arriving through the transmission line 19 is received by the cable telephone terminal 27 and demodulated, and then the analog telephone terminal 28, ISDN (Integrat).
ed service digital network) terminal 29 and data broadcasting terminal 30, the corresponding terminal is selectively supplied.

Furthermore, the analog telephone terminals 28 and I
The upstream data transmitted from the SDN terminal 29 is converted into an upstream signal by being subjected to modulation processing by the cable telephone terminal 27, and is transmitted to the CATV broadcasting center 11 via the transmission line 19.

Here, the downlink signal transmitted from the CATV broadcasting center 11 has a transmission band of 70 MHz to 1 GHz, as shown in FIG.
In the case of the V broadcast system, the downlink broadcast signal is mixed and transmitted. The downlink telephone carrier shown in FIG. 2 is modulated by a modulation method in which 4 carriers are included in 6 MHz which is the bandwidth of one channel of an analog video signal.

As the transmission band of the upstream signal transmitted from the subscriber terminal 20, 10 MHz to 50 MHz is used. Uplink telephone carriers are 6
It is a format in which 4 carriers are transmitted in the MHz bandwidth.

Next, FIG. 3 shows the format of the downlink and uplink data. That is, the FS indicating the start of one frame at the beginning of the downstream and upstream data strings
There is a (Frame Sync) bit string, followed by delay control data and call control data, and the remaining areas are all assigned to the communication time slots TS1 to TSn.

FIG. 4 shows the cable telephone terminal 2 described above.
7 shows details of No. 7. First, a downlink signal arriving via the transmission line 19 is supplied to the digital demodulation circuit 33 after passing through the TDMA transmission module 31 and the reception module 32, and subjected to demodulation processing. The demodulated downlink data output from the digital demodulation circuit 33 is supplied to the decoder circuit 34, subjected to predetermined decoding processing, error correction processing, and the like, and then supplied to the TDMA control circuit 35.

The TDMA control circuit 35 converts the downlink data output from the decoder circuit 34 into the analog telephone terminal 28, the ISDN terminal 29 and the data broadcasting terminal 3.
Allocate to data supplied to 0. Each of the distributed data is a telephone I / F (Inter / Face) circuit 36, an ISDN I / F circuit 37, and a data broadcasting I / F.
Via the F circuit 38, each analog telephone terminal 28, ISD
It is supplied to the N terminal 29 and the data broadcasting terminal 30.

Further, when the downlink data output from the decoder circuit 34 includes data for voice announcement broadcasting, the TDMA control circuit 35 controls the voice announcement broadcasting data with a volume control function. Control is performed so that reproduction is performed by the built-in speaker 40 via the circuit 39.

On the other hand, the analog telephone terminal 28 and IS
The upstream data transmitted from the DN terminal 29 is used for telephone I / O.
TD via the F circuit 36 and the ISDN I / F circuit 37
It is supplied to the MA control circuit 35. In this case, the TDMA control circuit 35 uses the telephone I / F circuit 36 and the ISDN I / F circuit 36.
The upstream data output from the / F circuit 37 is converted into frame units having a bit rate adapted to the communication specifications.

The upstream data converted into frame units by the TDMA control circuit 35 is encoded by the encoder circuit 41.
After the error correction code is added in, the delay control circuit 42 adds the delay control data, the digital modulation circuit 43 performs a modulation process, and then the transmission line is transmitted through the amplifier circuit 44 and the TDMA transmission module 31. 19 will be sent.

Here, the TDMA transmission module 31 is used.
The receiving module 32 is controlled by the module control circuit 45. The operation of the cable telephone terminal 27 described above is performed by a CPU (Central Processing).
Unit) 46. This CPU46
Controls the TDMA control circuit 35 and the encoder circuit 41 via the CPU I / F circuit 47. further,
The CPU 46 controls the timing generation circuit 48 via the CPU I / F circuit 47 to generate a timing signal to be given to the TDMA control circuit 35.

The CPU 46 uses the program RO
The operation of the cable telephone terminal 27 is controlled based on the program stored in the M (Read Only Memory) 49. Further, the CPU 46 includes a display unit 50 and an operation unit 5.
1 are connected to each other. Furthermore, in FIG.
Reference numeral 52 is a power supply circuit, which converts commercial power into a DC voltage of a required level in the cable telephone terminal 27 and supplies it to each circuit block.

In the cable telephone terminal 27 as described above, the features of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings. That is, this cable telephone system has the voice announcement broadcasting function as described above. This audio announcement broadcasting function is designed to send audio announcement data to a plurality of child stations by a parent station, and each child station to a plurality of grandchild stations, and reproduce it by a built-in speaker of each terminal. Is.

In this case, the master station is, for example, CATV.
Places where emergency broadcasting is required are selected, such as the broadcasting center 11, the fire department and the municipal offices. Further, as the slave station, a place for broadcasting simultaneously, such as a school or a public hall, is selected. Further, as the sub-station, a place where group broadcasting is performed, such as a town president's house or a ward mayor's house, is selected.

Here, the voice announcement broadcast is roughly classified into two types, a normal broadcast and an emergency broadcast. Then, in an emergency broadcast, the emergency broadcast mode is set and the cable telephone terminal 2
7 is forcibly switched to the announcement broadcast receiving state. However, since the volume of the announcement broadcast is adjusted independently for each cable telephone terminal 27, even if the cable telephone terminal 27 is forcibly switched to the announcement broadcasting reception state during emergency broadcasting, It is easy to overhear and the contents of emergency broadcasts often do not reach each subscriber.

FIG. 5 shows the details of the control circuit 39. That is, 53 is an input terminal, which is the TDMA
The data for voice announcement broadcasting output from the control circuit 35 is supplied. The voice announcement broadcast data supplied to the input terminal 53 is supplied to one input end of the switch circuit 54. At the other input terminal of the switch circuit 54,
A reference signal for volume adjustment output from the reference signal generation circuit 55 is supplied. Then, this switch circuit 54
Is normally switched to select the voice announcement broadcast data under the control of the microcomputer 56.

Therefore, the voice announcement broadcast data selected by the switch circuit 54 is the voice codec circuit 57.
Is supplied to the PCM digital audio data to be converted into an analog audio signal. Then, the analog audio signal output from the audio codec circuit 57 is supplied to the electronic volume 58 to be subjected to volume adjustment processing, and then reproduced by the built-in speaker 40.

In this case, the electronic volume 58 is also controlled by the microcomputer 56. That is,
An up switch 59 and a down switch 60 are connected to the microcomputer 56, and the microcomputer 56 keeps the volume up while the up switch 59 is on.
The electronic volume 58 is controlled so as to keep the volume down while the down switch 60 is in the ON state.

A volume setting switch 61 is connected to the microcomputer 56. When the volume setting switch 61 is turned on, the microcomputer 56 enters the volume setting mode. In this case, the microcomputer 56 controls the switch circuit 54 so as to select the reference signal for volume adjustment output from the reference signal generation circuit 55.

Therefore, the reference signal selected by the switch circuit 54 is reproduced by the built-in speaker 40 via the audio codec circuit 57 and the electronic volume 58. At this time, the volume is adjusted by selectively operating the up switch 59 and the down switch 60. In this case, the volume is adjusted to be the volume required for emergency broadcasting. And the volume adjustment is completed,
When the volume setting switch 61 is returned to the off state, the microcomputer 56 at this time
After storing the data value that has been controlled in the non-volatile memory 62, the volume setting mode is released.

Here, in the state where the volume setting mode is released, during normal broadcasting, as described above, the microcomputer 56 selects the switch circuit 54 so as to select the voice announcement broadcasting data supplied to the input terminal 53. In addition to the control, the up switch 59 and the down switch 60 control the electronic volume 58 to adjust the volume.

On the other hand, during an emergency broadcast, control data indicating that the broadcast is an emergency broadcast is supplied from the CPU 46 via the input terminal 63 to the microcomputer 56. Then, the microcomputer 56 causes the nonvolatile memory 62 to
The electronic volume 58 is controlled based on the data value stored in, and the emergency broadcast is reproduced at the volume required for the emergency broadcast.

Therefore, according to the above-described embodiment, the sound volume setting switch 61 is turned on to preset the sound volume during the emergency broadcast. At the time of the emergency broadcast, the preset sound volume is set to the preset sound volume. Since the voice notification is made, it is possible to prevent the emergency broadcast from being missed, and to surely spread the contents of the emergency broadcast to each subscriber, which makes it more suitable for practical use.

The volume setting switch 61 shown in FIG.
As shown in FIG. 3, the cable telephone terminal 27 is installed inside the housing 64, and the side surface or the back surface 64 of the housing 64.
It is operated by inserting the jig 65 into the through hole 64b formed in a. Therefore, it is possible to prevent the set volume adjustment during the emergency broadcast from being carelessly disturbed as much as possible, and this is also suitable for practical use.

Here, in order to prevent the set volume adjustment during emergency broadcasting from being carelessly disturbed, means shown in FIGS. 7 to 11 can be considered. First, as shown in FIG. 7, the volume setting switch 61 installed inside the casing 64 of the cable telephone terminal 27 is attached to the bottom 64 of the casing 64.
The jig 65 is operated by inserting the jig 65 into the through hole 64d formed in c.

Further, as shown in FIG. 8, the volume setting switch 61 is installed on the front panel 64e of the casing 64 of the cable telephone terminal 27, and the up switch 59 and the down switch 59 are operated while pressing the volume setting switch 61. By selectively operating the switch 60, the volume is adjusted during an emergency broadcast, and by stopping the pressing operation of the volume setting switch 61, the volume is set.

Further, in the structure shown in FIG. 9, when the power switch 66 provided on the front panel 64e of the housing 64 is in the off state, the volume setting switch 61 also provided on the front panel 64e is pressed and operated. Power switch 6
By turning 6 on, the user can enter the volume setting mode.

In FIG. 10, the personal computer 67 is used to identify the ID of the cable telephone terminal 27.
When setting the (identification) number, the nonvolatile memory 62
The data that determines the volume during emergency broadcasting is written in. Further, as shown in FIG. 11, the CATV broadcasting center 11 writes data for determining the volume during emergency broadcasting in the nonvolatile memory 62 of the cable telephone terminal 27 by polling processing. It should be noted that the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiment, and can be variously modified and implemented without departing from the scope of the invention.

[0047]

As described above in detail, according to the present invention,
In announcement broadcasting, which is one of the services of the cable telephone system, it is possible to set the volume for emergency broadcasting separately from that for normal broadcasting in advance, so that it can be used even more practically. A telephone terminal device can be provided.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an outline of a CATV broadcasting system to which a cable telephone system is applied, showing an embodiment of a cable telephone terminal device according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram shown for explaining frequency allocation of upstream and downstream data in the cable telephone system.

FIG. 3 is a diagram shown for explaining a format of upstream and downstream data.

FIG. 4 is a block configuration diagram showing details of a cable telephone terminal in the cable telephone system.

FIG. 5 is a block configuration diagram showing details of a control circuit in the cable telephone terminal.

FIG. 6 is a first volume setting operation means in the control circuit.
FIG. 3 is a side sectional view shown for explaining the example of FIG.

FIG. 7 is a second volume control operating means in the control circuit.
FIG. 3 is a side sectional view shown for explaining the example of FIG.

FIG. 8 is a third volume control operating means in the control circuit.
The front view shown in order to demonstrate the example of FIG.

FIG. 9 is a fourth volume control operating means in the control circuit.
The front view shown in order to demonstrate the example of FIG.

FIG. 10 is a block configuration diagram shown for explaining a fifth example of a volume setting operation means in the control circuit.

FIG. 11 is a block diagram showing a sixth example of a volume setting operation means in the control circuit.

[Explanation of symbols]

 11 ... CATV broadcasting center, 12 ... Antenna, 13 ... Tuner, 14 ... Modulation circuit, 15 ... Antenna, 16 ... Tuner, 17 ... Modulation circuit, 18 ... Mixed demultiplexing circuit, 19 ... Transmission line, 20 ... Subscriber terminal, 21 ... PBX device, 22 ... Demand assignment control circuit, 231-23n ... TDMA control circuit, 241-24n ... Digital modulation / demodulation circuit, 25 ... CATV home terminal, 26 ... Television receiver, 27 ... Cable telephone terminal, 28 ... Analog Telephone terminal, 29 ... ISDN terminal, 30 ... Data broadcasting terminal, 31 ... TDMA transmission module, 32 ... Reception module, 33 ... Digital demodulation circuit, 34 ... Decoder circuit, 35 ... TDMA control circuit, 36 ... Telephone I / F circuit , 37 ... ISDN I / F circuit, 38 ... Data broadcasting I / F circuit, 39 ... Control circuit, 40 ... Built-in speaker, 41 ... Encoder circuit, 42 ... Delay control circuit, 43 ... Digital modulation circuit, 44 ... Amplification circuit, 45 ... Module control circuit, 46 ... CPU, 47 ... CPU I / F circuit , 48 ... Timing generating circuit, 49 ... Program ROM, 50 ... Display unit, 51 ... Operating part, 52 ... Power supply circuit, 53 ... Input terminal, 54 ... Switch circuit, 55 ... Reference signal generating circuit, 56 ... Microcomputer, 57 ... audio codec circuit, 58 ... electronic volume, 59 ... up switch, 60 ... down switch, 61 ... volume setting switch, 62 ... non-volatile memory, 63 ... input terminal, 64 ... housing, 65 ... jig, 66 ... power supply Switch, 67 ... Personal computer.

Claims (10)

[Claims] 1. A cable telephone terminal device for use in a cable telephone system using a network of a wired two-way broadcasting system for receiving voice announcement broadcast and reproducing voice, adjusting the volume at the time of voice reproduction. Volume control operator, storage means for storing data corresponding to the volume set by the volume control operator, and voice reproduction at a volume based on the data stored in the storage means during the emergency voice announcement broadcast. A cable telephone terminal device comprising a control means for performing the operation. 2. The storage means stores data corresponding to a volume set by the volume adjusting operator in a state where a volume setting mode is set.
The described cable telephone terminal device. 3. The cable telephone terminal device according to claim 2, wherein the volume setting mode is set in association with an operation of a volume setting operator. 4. The cable telephone according to claim 3, wherein the volume adjustment in the volume setting mode is performed by simultaneously operating the volume adjusting operator while operating the volume setting operator. Terminal device. 5. The volume setting operator is installed in a casing of the cable telephone terminal device, and is operated by inserting a jig from a side surface or a rear surface of the casing. Cable telephone terminal equipment. 6. The cable according to claim 3, wherein the volume setting operator is installed in a casing of the cable telephone terminal device, and is operated by inserting a jig from a bottom surface of the casing. Telephone terminal equipment. 7. The cable telephone terminal device according to claim 4, wherein the volume setting operator is installed on a front panel of the cable telephone terminal device. 8. The volume setting mode is set by operating the power switch while operating the volume setting operator while the power switch of the cable telephone terminal device is off. The cable telephone terminal device according to claim 2. 9. The cable telephone terminal according to claim 1, wherein data corresponding to a predetermined volume is written in the storage means by an external device that sets an ID number for the cable telephone terminal device. apparatus. 10. The cable telephone terminal device according to claim 1, wherein data corresponding to a predetermined volume is written in the storage means by polling processing from the center device.