Patent ID: 6532513
Filing Date: 2003-03-11
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
An information recording and reproduction apparatus, comprising:a data transfer controller for receiving data to be written from a host computer; a cache data memory divided into a plurality of segments for temporarily storing said data which has been received by the data transfer controller; a segment connection information memory for storing segment connection information representing a logical connection state of the plurality of segments; a buffer memory controller for managing said data which is temporarily stored in the cache data memory; and a recording and reproduction controller for writing said data which is temporarily stored in the cache data memory into a recording medium, wherein the buffer memory controller changes a used segment among the plurality of segments into an unused segment based on an effective data flag which indicates that effective data is stored in the used segment, or a dirty flag which indicates that unwritten data, which has not been written into the recording medium, is stored in the used segment, so as to obtain a sufficient number of unused segments in order to process said data, and updates the segment connection information based on said segment change so as to change the logical connection state of the plurality of segments.