Patent ID: 6198705
Filing Date: 2001-03-06
Classification: G11B

Abstract:
An error-tolerant optical-disk controller comprising:a physical-target register for storing a physical-target identifier, the physical-target identifier uniquely identifying a physical-target sector on an optical disk;wherein the physical-target sector precedes a desired sector by N sectors wherein N is a programmable value greater than one, the desired sector containing data to be buffered to a host;a data stream from the optical disk, the data stream being demodulated and arranged into sectors, each sector containing a sync pattern, a header, and data;a sync-pattern detector, coupled to the data stream, for generating a sync clock when the sync pattern is detected in the data stream;a raw comparator, responsive to the sync clock, for comparing a raw identifier in the header from the data stream to the physical-target identifier and activating a good-sector-found signal when a match is found;a delay circuit, responsive to the good-sector-found signal, for waiting N sectors and then activating a start-buffering signal; anda buffer, for storing data in the desired sector for transfer to the host when the start-buffering signal is activated,whereby the physical-target sector is a programmable N sectors before the desired sector.