Sony Corporation

Tetsuhiro Shiomi

Takuya Niitsu

Tomoaki Morishita

Ryuji Takeda

Seiichiro Oishi

Katsuhiko Yamada

Kazuhiko Mori

Takashi Seki

Toshiyuki Hisatsune

Yasushi Saito

Akio Yamakawa

Takahiro Komazaki

Mitsuhiko Awata

Seiichiroh Ohishi

A disk drive apparatus for recording (writing) and/or reproducing (reading) information on an optical disk by rotating the optical disk, and adjusting the tilt angle of an optical pickup device with respect to the optical disk. A spindle chassis rotationally supports a turntable on which the optical disk is placed. A pickup chassis, rotationally supported on said spindle chassis, movably supports an optical pickup device that writes and/or reads the information to/from the optical disk and is movable toward and away from the turntable. A tilt mechanism adjusts the tilt angle of the optical pickup device with respect to the optical disk by rotating the pickup chassis with respect to the spindle chassis.

Apparatus and method for adjusting the tilt angle of an optical pickup device

A disc cartridge housing a disc-shaped recording medium in a main cartridge body portion is disclosed. The disc cartridge includes a main cartridge body portion having a circular medium housing section for rotationally housing a disc-shaped recording medium, a recording and/or reproducing opening for exposing at least a portion of the disc-shaped recording medium to outside and a driving opening for allowing intrusion of a rotating driving unit adapted for rotationally driving the disc-shaped recording medium. The disc cartridge also includes a shutter mechanism having a shutter member rotated along the major surface of the main cartridge body unit in a region provided with the medium housing section to open/close the recording and/or reproducing opening and a plurality of cartridge supporting portions at plural corner regions of larger area outside a region provided with the medium housing section of the main cartridge body unit. The disc cartridge is loaded on the recording and/or reproducing apparatus by the cartridge supporting portions being supported by a positioning mechanism provided on the recording and/or reproducing apparatus.

Disc cartridge

A system having a simple structure and highly precise data reproduction in which a disk tray is attached to a tray ascending/descending unit driven to be ascended or descended within a mechanical deck such that it can be loaded or unloaded in a horizontal direction, and one motor-type loading drive mechanism installed in the tray ascending/descending unit performs a pulling-in drive of the disk tray, a descending drive of the tray ascending/descending unit, a ascending drive of the tray ascending/descending unit and a pulling-out drive of the disk tray, respectively.

Disk drive apparatus

The object of the present invention is to propose an optical disk driving apparatus, an optical disk driving method and an optical disk apparatus capable of reducing the occurrence of disturbance to focus servo control and tracking servo control. In the optical disk driving apparatus, a tilt driving section ( ) is provided with waveform shaping unit for shaping a driving current waveform driving a tilt motor ( ) for changing the angle of an optical pickup ( ) with respect to the rotating surface of an optical disk. Thus, it is possible to prevent the vibration of the optical pickup ( ), to reduce disturbance derived from the vibration of an objective lens ( ) to focus control and tracking control and to suppress mechanical noise while tilt driving is being performed. Besides, since there is no need to provide a tilt sensor, the optical pickup ( ) can be made small in size and therefore, the smaller-sized optical disk driving apparatus can be provided.

Optical disk driving apparatus, optical disk driving method and optical disk apparatus

A disk drive apparatus for recording (writing) and/or reproducing (reading) an information signal by rotating an optical disk, and moving an optical pick-up device along an information recording face of the optical disk. A base chassis rotationally supports a turntable on which the optical disk is loaded. A head feed mechanism suitable for use in the disk drive apparatus includes a pick-up feed mechanism having a feed shaft for moving the optical pick-up device toward and away from the turntable. A bearing portion of the feed shaft is provided integrally with the base chassis.

Head feed mechanism for disk drive apparatus

A main cartridge body portion is formed with first and second openings facing first and second wall sections. These first and second openings are adapted for exposing a portion of the signal recording region of a disc-shaped recording medium to outside across inner and outer rims of the disc-shaped recording medium and for allowing the center of the disc-shaped recording medium to face outwards. First and second shutter members are arranged for movement between the first and second wall sections. The second shutter member is rotated in association with the first shutter member by having its portion engaged and held by an engagement holding portion provided on the first shutter member.

In order to enable a hand inserting direction against a disk tray to be freely changed during loading/unloading of a laser disk in respect to the disk tray, there is provided a disk drive apparatus in which a disk outer circumference mounting surface to be formed on the disk tray is formed substantially flush with an upper surface of the disk tray and its outer circumference is provided with a plurality of disk guides.

There is a problem that a high fitting accuracy between the table body and a chucking ring of a turntable is requested because the table body and the chucking ring are separately constituted and the chucking ring is integrated with the table body by fitting the ring to the body. The present invention relates to a disk drive comprising a turntable ( ) on which an optical disk ( ) used to reproduce an information signal is mounted and a spindle motor ( ) to whose rotating portion the turntable ( ) is set. The turntable ( ) is provided with a mounting portion ( ) on which the optical disk ( ) is mounted and a fitting portion ( ) to be fitted to the center hole ( ) of the optical disk ( ) and having an elastic piece ( ) to be pressure-welded to the inner periphery of the center hole ( ), in which the mounting portion ( ) and the fitting portion ( ) are formed into one body.

Mounting assembly for mounting a disk drive upon a turntable of a disk drive assembly

A disk recording/reproducing apparatus including a housing for accommodating a plurality of disks in an upright position along a circumference thereof, a disk driving device for recording/reproducing a disk, and a disk conveying belt for conveying the disk between the disk driving device and the housing, wherein the disk driving device is disposed in the center of the housing, thereby reducing the overall size of the apparatus.

Disk charger with circular disk housing and centrally arranged playback unit

A disc cartridge housing a driving rotating unit and adapted to be loaded along with the driving rotating unit on a recording and/or reproducing apparatus. A shutter mechanism for opening/closing an opening provided in a main cartridge body portion includes two shutter members movable along the major surface of the main cartridge body portion. An area in which the first shutter member and the second shutter member are moved is delimited by first and second wall sections arranged facing each other. The first and second shutter members are intruded into a spacing defined between the first and second wall sections. The first and second wall sections are arranged in the portions of the main cartridge body portion facing the major surface of the disc-shaped recording medium so that the wall sections face each other with a pre-set separation in-between. The main cartridge body portion is formed with first and second openings facing the first and second wall sections. These first and second openings are adapted for exposing a portion of the signal recording region of the disc-shaped recording medium to outside across the inner and outer rims of the disc-shaped recording medium and for allowing the center of the disc-shaped recording medium to face outwards. The first and second shutter members are arranged for movement between the first and second wall sections. The second shutter member is rotated in association with the first shutter member by having its portion engaged and held by an engagement holding portion provided on the first shutter member.

Assembly for a disc cartridge

A disc cartridge housing a disc-shaped recording medium in its main cartridge body portion is disclosed. The disc cartridge includes the main cartridge body portion having a circular medium housing section rotationally housing the disc-shaped recording medium and an opening for exposing at least a portion of the disc-shaped recording medium to outside, and first and second shutter members rotated along the major surface of the main cartridge body portion to open/close at least the above opening. The first shutter member is supported for rotation along the circular medium housing section provided on the main cartridge body portion. The second shutter member is supported by the main cartridge body portion for rotation in conjunction with the rotation of the first shutter member. When the first shutter member is moved to a first position overlying the opening, the second shutter member is intimately contacted with a lateral side of the first shutter member to overlie the opening. When the first shutter member is rotated to a position of exposing the opening, the second shutter member is rotated, along with the first shutter member, to a position of opening the above opening. Since the opening provided in the main cartridge body portion is opened/closed by the first and second shutter members moved along the major surface of the main cartridge body portion, the opening can be larger in size than the main cartridge body portion. The large-sized opening is positively opened/closed by the first and second shutter members.

Shutter assembly for a disc cartridge

A slide-feed drive part ( ) uses a stepping motor as a slide-feed motor for changing the position of a optical pick-up ( ) with respect to the rotation surface of an optical disk ( ), and has a micro-controller ( ) provided therein and a slide-feed motor controller ( ) both for correcting drive current waveforms to drive the stepping motor. Therefore, by correcting the motor driving waveforms, the optical pick-up ( ) can be linearly moved with respect to the rotation of the slide-feed motor ( ). It is thereby possible to do away with a position sensor and make a fine positional control of the optical pick-up ( ) with no variation. As a result of this, it is possible to provide an optical disk driving apparatus, an optical disk driving method, and an optical disk apparatus, which enhances the linearity of the rotation of the motor with a simple construction.

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Kanagawa, Japan

Tetsuhiro Shiomi