Patent ID: 8009533

Claim:
An optical disc apparatus to perform recording and/or reproducing operations onto and/or from an optical disc inserted therein, the apparatus comprising: an optical pickup including a light source to emit a laser beam according to an optical power signal, the laser beam having a first part directed onto the optical disc and a second part directed onto an optical power detector to detect an optical power of the emitted laser beam using the second part of the emitted laser beam, and an actuator to drive a lens to form a beam spot on the optical disc; a conveyor to move the optical pickup to a location corresponding to a specific area of a recording surface of the optical disc; a servo to control movement of the actuator of the optical pickup; and a controller to control the conveyor so that the optical pickup is positioned in a specific area of an optical disc and to apply a predetermined range of optical power signals to the light source to perform an optical power study after moving the optical pickup to the location and before performing recording and reproducing operations so as to determine optical power characteristics of the light source using the optical power signal and the detected optical power of the second part of the emitted laser beam while maintaining the actuator in a driving state in which both writing and reading are possible.