Dynamic information storage or retrieval – Information location or remote operator actuated control – Selective addressing of storage medium
Reexamination Certificate
1998-09-30
2002-06-11
Tran, Thang V. (Department: 2653)
Dynamic information storage or retrieval
Information location or remote operator actuated control
Selective addressing of storage medium
C369S034010, C369S030340
Reexamination Certificate
active
06404708
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to the field of optical data-storage apparatuses, and more particularly to an optical data-storage apparatus employing optical data-storage media having a three-dimensional data pattern for processing information in multitasking and in parallel.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
It is well known that a conventional computer system is nowadays generally equipped with a hard-disk drive, a removable-disk drive, a CD (compact-disc) drive, a floppy-disk drive, and/or a tape-backup drive for storing information. These drives basically utilize storage media such as magnetic disks, Bernoulli disks, optical/magneto-optical discs, and magnetic tapes, respectively. Among these media, magnetic tapes and even newly developed optical tapes are for use only in tertiary storage because information is stored thereon by a sequential access method and thus cannot be accessed at a speed acceptable by current computer practice.
The coexistence of hard-disk, CD, floppy-disk, backup, and other removable drives in computer signifies the fact that no single drive can simultaneously serve as secondary and tertiary storage. However, their combinations do not yield satisfactory overall performance because these conventional drives use different platforms and storage media in construction. Nor, can their combinations result in a user-friendly feature, because the conventional practice requires a purchased software program to go through a tedious software installation process through which all program files are decompressedly copied from an original software CD or floppy disks to a hard-disk drive wherefrom the software program is then executed.
In an attempt to resolve the disadvantages mentioned above and to allow software programs to be launched directly from their original discs just as the plug-and-plan feature of a SEGA- or Nintendo-type game system, Applicant has disclosed an information processing apparatus (called master drive hereinafter) to replace all of these conventional hard-disk, CD, floppy-disk, backup, and other removable drive, as detailed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,748,575. The master drive is in a single-platform construction utilizing optical discs as storage media so as to most-efficiently obtain all necessary functions and features of secondary and tertiary storage.
Among the conventional storage media between magnetic disks and optical discs, Applicant has suggested only the optical-disc media suitable for achieving the plug-and-play feature of software programs in conjunction with the master drive. Magnetic disks, due to lack of durability and storage density, are by no means suitable media for achieving the plug-and-play feature of software, that is one of the basic characteristics needed to form the master drive of my prior invention.
Conventional optical storage basically utilizes either optical discs or optical tapes as storage media. Comparably inferior to magnetic tapes, optical tapes are only suitable for applications in tertiary storage and will not be applicable for use in the master drive of my prior patent. Thus, among the conventional optical storage, only optical-disc media can be utilized in conjunction with secondary and tertiary storage. The optical disc medium is essentially a relative “flat” or two-dimensional plate having circular tracks made in a continuous spiral or many spirals from the inside to the outside of an optical disc. With respect to the so-called DVDs (digital video or versatile discs), information is stored on two layers (U.S. Pat. No. 4,682,321) or multiple surfaces (U.S. Pat. No. 5,487,060) at ifs different depths so as to greatly increase data density. Even though, these types of discs and their data surfaces are still generally in flat or two-dimension form.
Relatively recently, Applicant has discovered that the master drive utilizing the conventional optical-disc media may have an oversized plane that would prevent it from being integrated with a space-limited host for some particular applications. There appears no immediate solution for the concern if several turntables have to be generally aligned horizontally with each other. Furthermore, in such a master drive, each turntable is designed for mounting a disc thereon and the total number of discs will be fixed in accordance with the total number of the turntables. Thus, it is impossible to increase the total number of mountable discs. In other words, the optical-disc-based master drive may lack of flexibility in accommodating original software discs more than the turntables provided therein, even though some software discs contain much less data than others and each of them has to equally occupy a turntable.
Another Applicant's concern is how to raise the data transfer rate (or data throughput) of conventional optical data storage to a level comparable to that of a hard-disk drive utilizing magnetic-disk media. An earliest CD-ROM drive used in conjunction with a computer system has a characteristic of doublespin or the so-called 2×, equivalent to a data throughput of 0.3 MBps. The latest CD-ROM drives have advanced to 32× or a data throughput of 4.8 MBps. On the other hand, the newest CD-R (rewritable or recordable) drives remain to be 8× at best yet cost about a 10-fold higher than a typical 32× CD-ROM. To achieve a data throughput of 16.6 MBps that is nowadays typical in any hard-disk drives, a CD-ROM drive has to evolve into at least 110× that will minimally rotate from 55,000 rpm at start-up to 22,000 rpm at the outside edge of an 120 mm disc. This range of rotation speed reaches about an order of magnitude greater than a typical hard-disk drive, which will invoke technology far beyond our current knowledge and technological capability, especially, in view of the fact that the latest CD-R drives remain to be mostly in 2×.
With respect to CD-R drives, the most serious obstacle hindering their advance in speed is that the parameter of time is often essential for a material to transform between different states of phases or for a polymeric carry medium in a magneto-optical disc to be softened enough upon being exposed to an intense laser beam to allow embedded magnetically-sensitive, metallic crystals to undergo re-aligning movements. Thus, there is a strong need to conceive a new form of high-density optical-storage media and a new type of optical storage utilizing such a high-density optical-storage media different from the conventional optical-disc media used in current CD and/or CD-R drives so as to achieve a data throughput at a minimal level of a hard-disk drive.
With the concerns just mentioned hereinabove, Applicant now establishes the need, the incentive, and the application for developing a new form of optical-storage media and a new type of optical storage utilizing the new form of optical-storage media to achieve a throughput speed at least comparable to any current hard-disk drives.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
A first feature of the present invention is to improve the conventional optical information reproduction system by providing an optical data-storage medium with a base structure adapted to supply a peripheral surface, preferably in cylindrical form, with a medium adhered thereon, forming a three-dimensional data surface responsive to a light beam for providing optical signals corresponding to a plurality of data. The three-dimensional data surface having an imaginary straight center line is preferably selected from the group consisting of at least one helix, at least one ring, at least one circular track, at least one three-dimensional coil, at least one three-dimensional spiral, and their combinations. Preferably, the medium is responsive to an intense light beam to undergo changes between different states of phases or orientations for rewritably storing data thereon. The peripheral surface may contain at least one additional medium disposed with the medium to form a plurality of data surfaces at different depths each for storing a plurality of data thereon. Most preferably, the plur
Hartman & Hartman P.C.
Tran Thang V.
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