Alpine Electronics, Inc.

Masatoshi Ejiri

Manabu Kusano

Shinji Wakabayashi

A hardware constitution and method for playing back different types of media content is provided. Data is registered from a desired medium to a user data storing unit of a server from a PC. Content may then be selected by a vehicle onboard apparatus from the server. The data corresponding to the selected content is then transmitted to the vehicle onboard apparatus, and the data is decoded on the vehicle onboard apparatus using a decoder that corresponds to the content medium.

Method and apparatus for multimedia reproduction

A recording and playback apparatus according to the present invention includes a duplicating section for duplicating music data from a music CD in a CD read-out section onto a hard disk and a preserving section which, if duplication by the duplicating section is interrupted, preserves TOC information identifying the music CD and duplicated-music-data information identifying duplicated music data such that the TOC information is associated with the duplicated-music-data information. The recording and playback apparatus further includes a playback section for playing back music data stored in the hard disk. When a music CD having a history of interrupted duplication is placed in the CD read-out section, the duplicating section resumes duplication onto the hard disk based on the TOC information and the duplicated-music-data information preserved in the preserving section.

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Iwaki, Japan

Masatoshi Ejiri