Patent ID: 6934812

Claim:
A method for playing a media item on a media player, the media player having a storage disk and a cache memory, said method comprising the acts of: (a) receiving an indication of a particular media item to be played on the media player, the particular media item being one of a plurality of media items stored on the storage disk of the media player, the particular media item having an initial media data portion and a remaining media data portion, the remaining media data portion being different than and not including the initial media data portion; and (b) playing the particular media item on the media player, said playing (b) including at least: (b1) retrieving the initial media data portion of the particular media item from the storage disk; (b2) playing the initial portion of the particular media item using the initial media data portion as retrieved from the storage disk, without first storing the initial media data portion into the cache memory; (b3) loading, concurrently with at least one of said retrieving (b1) and said playing (b2), at least a remaining media data portion of the particular media item into the cache memory from the storage disk; and (b4) thereafter playing the remaining media data portion of the particular media item from cache memory.