Patent ID: 8085647

Claim:
An optical recording/reproducing apparatus having a label printer, and comprising: an optical disk drive unit to record and reproduce information on a recording surface of an optical disk; a label printer module to print labels on a label surface of the optical disk using thermal transfer in a printing operation; and a controller to control a label printing operation of the optical disk drive unit and the label printer module; the label printer module comprising: a ribbon cartridge on which a thermal transfer ribbon to which dyes are attached is wound and which is disposed to face the label surface of the optical disk mounted in the optical disk drive unit; and a thermal printhead to transfer the dyes attached to the thermal transfer ribbon onto the label surface of the optical disk using thermal transfer; the thermal transfer ribbon comprising: an undercoating layer region to absorb dyes, at least one dye region, and an overcoating layer region to form an overcoating layer on the label surface, to protect the dyes transferred onto the label surface of the optical disk, and wherein the thermal transfer ribbon is formed such that the undercoating layer region, the dye region, and the overcoating layer region are repeatedly formed along a longitudinal direction; wherein the optical disk is repeatedly ejected from and inserted into the optical disk drive unit during the printing operation; and when the optical disk is initially ejected, the undercoating layer is transferred onto the label surface of the optical disk, the at least one dye is sequentially transferred while the optical disk is repeatedly re-inserted and ejected, and the overcoating layer is transferred after the at least one dye is sequentially transferred, such that when the overcoating layer is transferred last, the optical disk is completely ejected.