Hitachi, Ltd.

Hitachi Video and Information System, Inc.

Kouji Minabe

Hideo Nishijima

Kouji Kaniwa

Hiroya Abe

Yoshio Narita

Hiroaki Ono

Teruo Hoshi

Kazunori Uemura

Masahiro Fujimoto

Shoji Ohno

Hiroo Okamoto

Takao Arai

Hitoaki Owashi

Takaharu Noguchi

Nobutaka Amada

Katsuyuki Watanabe

Kenji Sano

Yukinobu Tada

Masayuki Kijima

Akinori Shiozawa

Jun Ohya

Yukio Nakamura

Ko Kumagai

Takashi Tsujio

Michio Sagawa

An information recording apparatus such as an optical disc that can avoid an unrecordable condition between a power-on operation and an available state for recording thereby to solve a problem that an image taking chance is missed in a recording step, wherein its constitution is such that: receiving a command to turn on the apparatus after switching, a system controller drives a power-supply circuit to activate a drive controller and a memory controller; if the optical disc is not replaced while in power-off operation by a sub-battery, the system controller issues a request for high-speed activation, based on information stored in an EEPROM, to the drive controller, and drives plural drive control units one after another thereby to establish an activation period confirmedly, allowing the memory controller to accept a request for a recording start from the system controller without waiting for a report of activation completion to be issued by the drive controller.

Information recording apparatus

An optical disk apparatus which can carry out tilt control using a signal of a focus control system so as to improve the recording/reproducing performance of an optical disk. The optical disk apparatus includes a motor which rotates the optical disk, an optical pickup which reads at least information from the optical disk being rotated by the motor, a first memory which uses information of a rotation angle of the optical disk from the optical pickup as an address, a second memory which stores an offset by which information stored in the first memory should be shifted and then read, and a control portion which reads the information stored in the first memory after shifting the information by the offset stored in the second memory and which carries out tilt control using the read information.

Optical disk apparatus and tilt control method thereof

In an information recording apparatus, for conducting finalizing process on a removable recording medium with certainty, on which information is recorded in an easy format contained within a portable equipment in real-time manner, wherein the finalizing process is executed (stepsand) when a predetermined amount of capacity remains in a battery, or when an external electric power source is connected to (), depending upon a disc recording medium. Also, providing electric power saving () during time-period of this process and means () for inhibition of camera operation, for stoppage on a way and for re-recording, realizes the certain finalizing process. Further, a means is provided for conducting that process at high speed. Therefore, the finalizing process can be achieved with stability even in a portable equipment.

Information recording apparatus and information recording method

A signal recording/reproducing apparatus includes a first power source unit which generates necessary electric power signals from a commercial power source, a second power source unit which generates a necessary electric power signal from a battery, a recording signal processing unit, and a reproduced signal processing unit. The apparatus further includes time measuring instrument which is supplied with the electric power from the second power source unit, and a charging unit which charges the battery with the electric charges. Whenever the time measuring instrument measures a predetermined time, the generation of the electric power signals from the first power source unit is started, and the battery is charged with the electric charges by the charging unit.

Signal recording/reproducing apparatus with improved power consumption

System and method for controlling recording state transitions in an information recording apparatus

A recording apparatus of a helical scan system, including a first video head which records video signals on a magnetic tape when a running speed of the magnetic tape is a standard speed and a second video head which records video signals on the magnetic tape when the running speed of the magnetic tape is approximately 1/N of the standard speed, N being an integer larger than 3.

Recording/reproducing apparatus and reproducing apparatus

In a disk device, when processing is resumed after replacing the disk or cutting off the power supply, in order to acquire disk-related information in a short period of time and reduce the start-up time, the effectiveness of management information recorded on the disk is judged, the finding of the judgment is stored into a memory means capable of storing even when power supply is off, the management information is read out of some of the recording areas of the disk in advance of a recording or reproducing operation if the stored information on the finding of the judgment indicates effectiveness for the inserted disk.

Disk device, read control method for management information in disk device, and data processing terminal device using that disk device

When a video signal reproduced by a helical scan type video signal reproducing apparatus is displayed on the screen of a liquid crystal matrix circuit, a change in brightness on the screen is eliminated in a mode for displaying a trick reproduced image such as a noiseless search image, a still image or the like with respect to a mode for displaying a normally reproduced image, thus providing the user with displayed images causing a less feeling of strangeness. During normal reproduction, where a video signal is continuously written into a liquid crystal display circuit, the brightness of the liquid crystal display circuit is controlled based on the value in a reference brightness register set by the user. During trick reproduction, where a video signal is discontinuously written into the liquid crystal display circuit, the liquid crystal display circuit is controlled to display an image relatively darker than the value in the reference brightness register. This eliminates the difference in brightness between a normally reproduced image and a trick reproduced image, thereby allowing the user to have a less feeling of strangeness.

Video signal reproducing apparatus and video signal display apparatus

A magnetic recording and reproducing apparatus arranged to use a magnetic tape. The apparatus operates to derive the current taken-up position of the magnetic tape from the signals that are proportional to the rotation frequencies of a capstan motor, a supply reel and a take-up reel. Only when the taken-up position is near the tape end, the apparatus activates LEDs (light emitting elements) for sensing the tape end and photo-transistors (light receiving elements), for sensing the tape end.

Magnetic recording and reproducing apparatus arranged to save electric power consumed in detecting tape end and reduce load on microprocessor

In a recording/reproducing apparatus and a reproducing apparatus based on a helical scan system for recording or reproducing a video signal and an audio signal on or from a magnetic tape by use of a magnetic head assembly mounted on a rotary drum, the recording/reproduction of an audio signal in both a standard play mode with a tape speed equal to a standard speed and a long play mode or N-ple play mode with a tape speed N times (N: an integer not smaller than 4) as high as the standard speed is performed by a common audio head. At the time of reproduction in the N-ple play mode, the optimum tracking control is performed by a tracking control system by use of an output of the audio head. At the time of completion of recording in the N-ple play mode, a video signal is supplied with a time prolonged corresponding to the delay of scan of a video head from that of the audio head so that a video track is surely overwritten on an audio track. A high-speed fast feed/rewind speed at the time of N-ple play mode is set to a low value as compared with the tape speed at the time of standard play mode, thereby ensuring the detection of an index signal from the magnetic tape in the N-ple play mode.

Magnetic recording and reproducing apparatus arranged to save electric

A tracking apparatus for a helical scan magnetic recording/reproducing system includes a rotation speed controller for controlling the rotation speed of a capstan motor which transports a magnetic tape, a speed deviation generator for applying a deviation to the rotation speed, an envelope level detector for detecting the envelope level of a reproduced signal, a memory for storing the value of detection by the envelope level detector, and an envelope level comparator for comparing envelope levels before and after the deviation is applied to the rotation speed, whereby the rotation of the capstan motor is controlled so that the envelope level becomes a value in the vicinity of a maximum value. The tracking apparatus further includes a steady speed deviation detector for detecting a steady speed deviation between a recording apparatus and a reproducing apparatus, and a steady speed deviation corrector for correcting the detected speed deviation.

Recording and reproducing apparatus including a tracking apparatus with

A VCR integrally provided with a camera (camcorder) stops power supply at a non-recording mode for reducing power consumption. The camcorder is arranged to have power control units and a switch for controlling the start or the end of the recording operation and the power-on or power-off of at least one or more of a camera section, a VCR section and a display section, a time measuring unit, and a control unit for starting the recording unit a predetermined time later than when the camera section starts to pick up an image sequence and the image sequence appears on an electronic viewfinder or the like. Further, the camcorder includes units for moving a zoom lens to a Wide-terminal when powered off, when powered on or a predetermined time later than when powered off. Moreover, there are provided units for overlapping text information with the image sequence appearing on the electronic viewfinder. These units display a time left until the recording start. The camcorder further provides units for varying a predetermined time left until the recording start and units for selecting a moving timing on which the zoom lens is moved to the Wide-terminal so that the user may freely set the predetermined time and the moving timing.

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Hitachiota, Japan

Kouji Minabe