Patent ID: 7546396

Claim:
A vehicle entertainment and information system having a data transfer interface system, comprising: a plurality of data processing devices having access to a single data storage drive installed in a restricted space of a vehicle and comprising a first data processing device assigned with a first individual number of transfer operations and a second data processing device assigned with a second individual number of transfer operations, where the first and the second data processing devices individually have the access to the single data storage drive one at a time via a single signal line and have no simultaneous access to the single data storage drive; where the first data processing device independently performs a first individual task and the second data processing independently performs a second individual task by individually accessing the single data storage drive; where the single data storage drive is initialized by resetting to an initial status to carry out the first individual task or the second individual task; an interface controller connected with the first and the second data processing devices; a first switch connected to the interface controller and the single data storage drive for permitting an access of the first data processing device to the single data storage drive; a second switch connected to the interface controller and the single data storage drive for permitting the access of the second data processing device to the single data storage drive; where both the first switch and the second switch are coupled to the single data storage drive via the single signal line and the first switch is disabled when the second switch is enabled; a detection unit operable to detect access status of the single data storage drive by detecting completion of the transfer operations by the plurality of data processing devices, or operation status of the single data storage drive; and where the interface controller comprises a control device that drives the first switch and the second switch to permit access to the data storage drive one at a time based on the access status of the single data storage drive, and the control device disables the first switch and activates the second switch upon determination that the first data processing device performs more than the first number of transfer operations.