The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Dec. 16, 1997
Filed:
Aug. 30, 1995
Takashi Sato, Scarborough, NY (US);
Carlo Basile, Ossining, NY (US);
Philips Electronics North America Corporation, New York, NY (US);
Abstract
An information retrieval system in which information is stored in digital form in a serial access device such as a digital VCR, the information being organized as a library of successive albums, each album having successive tracks of individually identifiable items of information, such as audio performances, subjects or events. A random access device, such as a compact disc player or magnetic hard disc drive, has stored therein a portion of a preselected track of each album and a brief introductory portion of each of the remaining tracks in each album. Both devices are coupled to a common data bus and are controlled by a programmable processor so that during search intervals of the serial access device to access a selected album or track read-out thereof is initiated by the random access device. When the serial access device is ready to access selected track or album, read-out is switched over thereto. In this way the required storage capacity of the random access device is minimized while still providing random access to any album and to any track in an already designated album.