KR20050017663A - Method for setting a trick play area in a personal video recorder - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: A method for setting a trick play zone in a PVR(Personal Video Recorder) is provided to move a recording zone assigned for trick play purpose to other place of a recording medium, depending on whether the corresponding zone can be recordable, thereby obtaining stability of a data recording function and device reliability. CONSTITUTION: A system controller sends a write command or a read command to an HDD(S502). The HDD receives the command, and writes or reads A/V data in a trick play zone by responding to the command(S504,S506). If an access to the trick play zone is terminated, the system controller checks the number of defects generated from the trick play zone, and updates a table(S508). If the HDD is in idle state, the system controller is reported with the number of the defects(S510). The system controller checks a deteriorated state of a head as well as the number of the reported defects(S512). If an error rate of the head or the number of the defects exceeds a limited value, the system controller resets the trick play zone(S514,S516).

Description

Method for setting a trick play area in a personal video recorder}

The present invention relates to a method of storing a recording medium, and more particularly, in a recording apparatus for a personal recording function, by moving a recording area allocated for a trick play to another place of a recording medium according to whether the area can be recorded. A trick play area setting method for ensuring the stability of recording and the reliability of the apparatus.

With the development of digital broadcasting, there is a growing interest in personal recording devices. A personal video recorder (hereinafter referred to as a PVR) stores a broadcast signal compressed by an MPEG method in an internal or external recording medium, for example, a hard disk drive or an optical disk drive, and later stores the broadcast signal stored in such a recording medium. Is a device that extracts and plays back.

One of the important functions in such a PVR is a time shift function. This is to store the broadcast signal received by the user in the built-in recording medium and play it again at the time desired by the user. This time shift function allows a user to watch broadcast signals as if they were in real time by storing and replaying the broadcast contents during and after a while away to answer a call or to meet a guest.

On the other hand, an important feature of the PVR is the trick play function. The trick play function refers to a function of playing a broadcast program by various special playback methods such as fast forward, fast reverse, rewind, and the like.

For the time shift function or the trick play function, the PVR uses a certain area (usually a trick play area) of the recording medium. This trick play area is usually set for each zone and managed by a system controller. Broadcast signals that require storage are sequentially recorded in the set trick play area. If the set area is full, the previously recorded contents are deleted and new contents are overwritten from the beginning of the corresponding area.

This trick play area is more frequently accessed than other parts. If a problem occurs in this area, the data is less stable, resulting in a decrease in system performance.

For a hard disk drive, for example, the main contributor to problems is the defects that require auto reassign and the deterioration of the heads that require re-try. That is, when a large number of defects occur in an area allocated for the time shift function or a head that accesses the corresponding area is deteriorated, performance of the system may be degraded due to reassignment or retry operation.

The present invention has been devised to solve the above-described problem, and resets the trick play area when a defect or a deterioration of the head is caused to affect the system performance in the trick play area allocated for the time shift function or the trick play function. It is an object of the present invention to provide a trick play area setting method that prevents a decrease in system performance.

The trick play area setting method according to the present invention for achieving the above object is

A method of setting a trick play area for a time shift function or a trick play function on a recording medium in a personal recording device,

Accessing the recording medium to record or reproduce data;

When the operation of accessing the recording medium is completed, investigating the number of defects of the recording medium and the deterioration state of the head accessing the trick play area;

Determining whether the number of defects in the trick play area exceeds the limit or the degree of deterioration of the head exceeds the limit by referring to the defect number of the recording medium and the deterioration state of the head; And

And if the number of defects exceeds a limit or the degree of deterioration of the head exceeds a limit, resetting the trick play area.

Hereinafter, the configuration and operation of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a system in which a PVR is installed. The PVR 100 receives and reproduces an airwave broadcast signal transmitted from a broadcasting station through the air antenna 102, or records it after a user's request and plays it later, or performs a trick play function. In addition, the PVR 100 is connected to the cable converter 104 to receive various cable broadcast signals transmitted from the cable broadcasting station 106. The cable converter 104 receives the cable broadcast signal applied from the cable broadcasting station 106 and processes the signal, and transmits the resulting AV signal to the PVR 100.

2 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a general PVR.

In the apparatus shown in FIG. 2, the tuner unit 202 tunes a broadcast signal input through the antenna 102, and outputs an AV signal by tuning to a broadcast station desired by a user under the control of the system controller 214. . The output AV signal is input to the MPEG encoder 204 and the A / V converter 212. When the input AV signal is input to the MPEG encoder 204, the AV signal is a path for playback after recording. In the case of input, it is a path for direct reproduction.

The MPEG encoder 204 incorporates an analog digital converter (ADC) to convert an input analog signal into a digital signal. That is, the MPEG encoder 204 receives the AV signal from the tuner unit 202, digitizes it in real time, codes the compressed MPEG data, and outputs it to a HDD (Hard Disc Dirve) 206, which is a recording medium. When the PVR 100 includes a digital tuner for receiving digital broadcasts, MPEG TS (Trans Stream) is received through the digital tuner, and thus the PVR 100 does not need to go through the MPEG encoder 204.

In addition, the MPEG decoder 208 decodes the MPEG data stored in the HDD 206 to generate an analog signal. That is, the MPEG decoder 208 has a built-in digital analog converter (DAC) to convert digital data stored in the HDD 206 into an analog signal. The analog signal converted by the MPEG decoder 208 is output to the A / V switching unit 212.

On the other hand, the video processor 210 includes a caption processing function, a picture in picture (PIP) function, and configures a screen other than a broadcast screen and outputs the screen to the A / V switching unit 212.

The A / V switching unit 212 synthesizes an analog signal from the tuner unit 202, an analog signal from the MPEG decoder 208, an analog signal from the video processor 210, and the like, and inputs it to the input terminal of the TV 108. Output

The PVR 100 may include a function of displaying broadcast programming information to a user in order to provide a recording function. The PVR 100 may store broadcast programming information processed by the packet processing unit 220 in the RAM 218 and may include a system controller ( The control unit 214 outputs necessary broadcast information to the video processor 210. The ROM 216 stores a program necessary for the operation of the system controller 214.

3 shows a storage area of the HDD 206 shown in FIG. 2. As shown in FIG. 3, the storage space of the HDD 206 is divided into a user area 302 for storing user data and a trick play area 304 for a time shift function and trick play. The user area 302 is an area for general storage such as recording and scheduled recording, and the content of the trick play area 304 is that the stored content is continuously maintained and can be managed by the user's selection. It is not persistently maintained, and the stored content is managed by the system control unit, not by the user. That is, the trick play area is a section set by the system controller and cannot be accessed by the user.

The track play area 304 has a FIFO (First In First Out) function, and when data is stored to the end of the set area, data is recorded again from the beginning.

4 is a conceptual diagram showing a storage and playback method for a trick play function in a conventional PVR.

When the power of the PVR device is turned on or the function for time shift and trick play is enabled, the system controller 214 applies a command for recording or reproducing the trick play area to the HDD (S402).

The HDD 206 receives a command from the system control unit 214 (S404), and in response, records or plays back the A / V data in the trick play area. (S406) The trick play area is usually a zone unit. Is set to. Since the disc rotation speed, recording / playback channel parameters, and access speed are different for each zone, the trick play area is distributed and used in multiple zones in consideration of the characteristics of real-time and continuous A / V data. This is because it is more efficient to assign and use one zone.

The PVR 100 automatically performs a trick play program from the time of power-on or when the corresponding function is enabled so that the broadcast program can perform a trick play function such as fast forward, fast reverse, rewind, and the like. Will be stored in the area. In other words, the trick play area is continuously and repeatedly accessed.

Therefore, the track play area has a greater number of times of access than the user area, and therefore, there is a high possibility that defects or heads that cause reallocation may occur. If a defect occurs, it takes time for reassignment. If a head deteriorates, it takes time for retry.

Such defects and deterioration of the head cause serious problems such as an increase in buffer capacity, a decrease in system performance and reliability in an AV system that emphasizes real-time transmission.

According to the method of the present invention, it is possible to determine whether the trick play area is recordable, that is, whether there is a defect or a deterioration of the head enough to affect the real time storage of the AV data, and resetting the trick play area according to the determination result. It features.

Defects and deterioration of the head are reported to the system control unit by a recording apparatus which records on the recording medium, and the system control unit determines whether to reset the trick play area with reference to this report. Preferably, the recording device reports the degree of deterioration of the defect and the head to the system control unit in the idle state of the recording device.

5 is a conceptual diagram showing a method according to the present invention.

When the power of the PVR device is turned on or the function for trick play is enabled, the system controller applies a command to the HDD for recording or reproducing the trick play area (S502).

The HDD receives a command from the system control unit, and in response thereto, records or plays back the A / V data in the trick play area (S504, S506).

When the operation by the command from the system controller is completed, that is, when the operation of accessing the trick play area is completed, the number of defects in the trick play area is examined and the table is updated (s508). Stored.

When the HDD is in the idle state, the defect number is reported to the system controller (S510).

The system controller determines whether the currently set trick play area can be recorded by referring to the number of defects reported from the HDD and the deterioration state of the head.

In detail, the system controller checks the number of defects reported from the HDD and the deterioration state of the head.

If the number of defects exceeds the limit or the error rate of the head exceeds the limit, the trick play area is reset (S514, S516). The newly set trick play area is accessed to perform a subsequent trick play and a corresponding function. do. Also, the area previously used for trick play is used as the user area. Here, the limit of the number of defects and the limit of the error rate of the head are set to correspond to the degree of difficulty in performing real-time recording of AV data.

6 is a flowchart showing a preferred embodiment of the trick play area setting method according to the present invention. In FIG. 6, steps S602 to S614 are performed by the HDD which is a recording device, and steps S616 to S626 are performed by the system controller.

First, the HDD performs a read / write command applied from the system controller (S602). The trick play area and the user area are accessed by the read / write command.

It is determined whether there is a reallocation operation by the defect (S604). If there is a reallocation operation, the defect number is updated.

It is determined whether the execution of the command is terminated (S608). If the execution of the command is not finished, the process returns to the process S902.

It is determined whether it is in the idle state (S610). If it is not in the idle state, normal processing is performed.

If it is in the idle state, that is, if the state in which no command is applied from the system control unit for a predetermined time continues, the number of defects per area of the HDD is transmitted to the system control unit (S614).

The system controller checks whether the number of defects and the head specification of the currently set trick play area exceeds the limit by referring to the defect number and the head specification reported from the HDD. (S618, S620) The head specification is an error in the trick play area. Judging by the rate.

If the number of defects and the head specification of the currently set trick play area do not exceed the limit, a normal process is performed (S622).

If the number of defects and the head specification exceed the limit, a new zone for trick play is selected (S624).

The selected zone is set as the trick play area. (S626) The previous trick play area is reset to the user area.

The invention can be practiced as a method, apparatus, system, or the like. When implemented in software, the constituent means of the present invention are code segments that necessarily perform the necessary work. The program or code segments may be stored in a processor readable medium or transmitted by a computer data signal coupled with a carrier on a transmission medium or network. Processor readable media includes any medium that can store or transmit information. Examples of processor-readable media include electronic circuits, semiconductor memory devices, ROMs, flash memory, erasable ROM (EROM), floppy disks, optical disks, hard disks, optical fiber media, radio frequency (RF) networks, Etc. Computer data signals include any signal that can propagate over transmission media such as electronic network channels, optical fibers, air, electromagnetic fields, RF networks, and the like.

Certain embodiments shown and described in the accompanying drawings are to be understood as examples of the invention only, and not to limit the scope of the invention, but also within the scope of the technical field to which the invention belongs As various other changes may occur, it is obvious that the invention is not limited to the specific constructions and arrangements shown or described.

As described above, the method for setting a trick play area according to the present invention improves the performance of the PVR apparatus by determining whether the currently set trick play area is suitable for real time recording of AV data, and resetting the trick play area according to the result. In addition to the effect of ensuring the reliability.

1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a system in which a PVR is installed.

2 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a general PVR.

3 shows a storage area of the HDD 206 shown in FIG. 2.

4 is a conceptual diagram showing a storage and playback method for a trick play function in a conventional PVR.

5 is a conceptual diagram showing a method according to the present invention.

6 is a flowchart showing a preferred embodiment of the trick play area setting method according to the present invention.

Claims (4)

A method of setting a trick play area for a time shift function or a trick play function on a recording medium in a personal recording device, Accessing the recording medium to record or reproduce data; When the operation of accessing the recording medium is completed, investigating the number of defects of the recording medium and the deterioration state of the head accessing the trick play area; Determining whether the number of defects in the trick play area exceeds the limit or the degree of deterioration of the head exceeds the limit by referring to the defect number of the recording medium and the deterioration state of the head; And And resetting the trick play area when the number of defects exceeds a limit value or the degree of deterioration of the head exceeds a limit value. The method of claim 1, wherein the accessing process is an access to a trick play area. The method of claim 1, wherein the degree of deterioration of the head is determined by an error rate of a currently set trick play area. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the number of defects of the recording medium and the deterioration state of the head are provided to the controller of the PVR in an idle state of the recording apparatus for driving the recording medium. And the controller of the PVR resets the trick play area with reference to the provided defect number and the deterioration state of the head.