Patent ID: 6914858

Claim:
An optical pickup for high density recording and reproduction, comprising: a light source unit to emit a plurality of light beams, such that a plurality of light spots are formed on a same track of an information recording surface of a recording medium; an objective lens to focus the light beams incident from the light source unit to form the light spots on the information recording surface of the recording medium; an optical path changer disposed on an optical path between the light source unit and the objective lens, to alter a traveling path of the light beams reflected from the information recording surface incident from the objective lens; a photodetector to receive and photoelectrically convert the light beams incident from the objective lens and the optical path changer after having been reflected from the recording medium, and to output detection signals; and a reproduction signal detecting circuit to delay one of the detection signals output from the photodetector to remove a time gap between the delayed detection signal and an undelayed one of the detection signals, and to sum the delayed detection signal and the undelayed detection signal, to detect a reproduction signal.