Patent ID: 6226447
Filing Date: 2001-05-01
Classification: H04H,H04N

Abstract:
An apparatus for recording a video signal including a plurality of frames onto a hard disk apparatus and reproducing the video signal recorded onto the hard disk apparatus, comprising:receiving means for receiving a video signal;compression means for compressing an amount of information per a unit of M frames of the received video signal so as to output a compressed video signal;time compression means for compressing an amount of time per a unit of N*M frames of the compressed video signal along a time axis so as to obtain a compressed video writing signal;writing means for writing the compressed video writing signal onto a plurality of different portions of the hard disk apparatus via a magnetic head, each of the plurality of different portions having successive L sectors, N*M frames of the compressed video writing signal being written onto the successive L sectors;reading means for reading an arbitrary compressed video writing signal, which was previously written onto the plurality of different portions of the hard disk apparatus, from the hard disk apparatus via the magnetic head to obtain a compressed video reading signal;time decompression means for decompressing an amount of time per a unit of N*M frames of the compressed video reading signal along the time axis so as to obtain a decompressed video signal for reproduction;decoding means for decompressing an amount of information per a unit of M frames of the decompressed video signal for reproduction; andcontrol means for controlling the writing means and the reading means such that a period during which the compressed video writing signal is written onto the hard disk apparatus does not overlap with a period during which the compressed video reading signal is read from the hard disk apparatus, where L, M and N each is an integer greater than or equal to 1,wherein a period for the compressed video signal which is output from the compression means is set to be longer than time T.where the time T is defined as a sum of seek time required for moving the magnetic head to write the compressed video writing signal onto the hard disk apparatus, time required for writing the compressed video writing signal onto the hard disk apparatus, seek time required for moving the magnetic head to read the compressed video reading signal from the hard disk apparatus, and time required for reading the compressed video reading signal from the hard disk apparatus.