Patent ID: 7062158

Claim:
A data recording/reproducing apparatus, comprising: recording area setting means of setting a plurality of logical recording areas in a recording medium which is for recording and reproducing data; and file management means which refers to free area management information, which is for managing a free area capacity for each one of said recording areas, recording file management information, which is for managing a file to be recorded for each one of said recording areas, and deletion file selecting criteria information, which is for selecting a file to be deleted for each one of said recording areas, and executes management of said files, wherein for writing of new data in a predetermined recording area, when said file management means judges that a free area for writing said new data is insufficient with reference to said free area management information, said file management means, referring to said deletion file selecting criteria information, deletes a portion or all of at least one file which is recorded in said predetermined recording area or does not execute an operation for writing said new data, said deletion file selecting criteria information includes a deletion criteria based on a number of times a data file has been viewed, said file management means includes setting the number of times each of the stored data files has been viewed, and said file management means deletes the at least one file, if (i) a predetermined storage capacity available for the free area is smaller than an amount of data required to store said new data and (ii) the deletion criteria is satisfied which is based on the number of times a data file has been viewed, and the number of times the data file has been viewed is greater than one.