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Personal spectrum recorderRelated Patent Categories: Television Signal Processing For Dynamic Recording Or Reproducing, Processing Of Television Signal For Dynamic Recording Or Reproducing, Including Programmable ApparatusPersonal spectrum recorder description/claimsThe Patent Description & Claims data below is from USPTO Patent Application 20070166003, Personal spectrum recorder. Brief Patent Description - Full Patent Description - Patent Application Claims
RELATED APPLICATIONS [0001] This application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. .sctn. 119(e) to U.S. Provisional Application Ser. No. 60/363,133, dated Mar. 11, 2002, entitled "Personal Time Shift Radio Recorder (PRR)/Time Shift Radio," the contents of which are herein incorporated by reference. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0002] 1. Field of the Invention [0003] The present invention relates to the concurrent capture and demodulation of a full region of spectrum of selectable radio frequencies typically containing audio and communication signals for time shifting, random access of individual channels or time frames, digital recording and advanced content management. [0004] 2. Description of Related Art [0005] Currently, state of the art audio systems provide live playback of audio broadcast signals. These audio systems accept a wide-band signal and selectively demodulate a signal channel of the broadcast audio spectrum for playback. For example, a frequency modulated ("FM") stereo tuner receives a radio frequency band described as the FM band. In the United Sates, this band include radio frequency energy from 87 MHz to 108 MHz, which includes approximately 100 channels separated by 200 kHz. A listener can adjust the tuner to receive any one of the channels of audio signals for playback at one time. For instance, the listener may adjust his FM tuner to receive 88.1 MHz, or 88.3 MHz. The FM tuner will then demodulate the base-band audio signal present at 88.1 MHz., and allow the listener to hear the live audio broadcast present at that frequency. [0006] Many of these channels provide news, weather or traffic information broadcasts that are helpful to listeners. For instance, a listener may hear a traffic information broadcast while driving to work. The broadcast allows the listener to modify his driving route to minimize travel delays due to traffic. Similarly, weather broadcasts allow listeners to adjust their activities according to the current or forecast weather. Finally, listeners can hear news broadcast to stay informed of current events. [0007] Additionally, some radio stations broadcast data along with the audio. This data can be extracted and stored by certain state of the art systems and used to display textual information relating to the content of the audio broadcast. This textual information may provide the identity of a broadcast, advertising information, or other pertinent information about the broadcast. This information can be used in a variety of ways by existing systems. [0008] However, a problem with state of the art audio systems is that such systems require listeners to adjust the audio system tuner to the station at the time the broadcast is occurring. Moreover, they must listen to the broadcast as it occurs. For example, if the listener has adjusted his tuner to channel A, and the traffic report is occurring on channel B, the listener will miss the traffic report completely. Another problem with such systems is that if the listener is not listening to the broadcast, no practical method exists for accessing the missed broadcast for later playback. For example, if the listener turns on his state of the art audio system at 8:00 AM, but the traffic broadcast occurred at 7:50 AM, the listener will have completely missed the traffic broadcast. Yet another problem with such systems is that if the listener hears the end of a news broadcast and wishes to hear a missed portion, no method exists for replaying the missed portion. Moreover, if the listener becomes interrupted while listening to an audio broadcast, the listener cannot simply replay the broadcast. [0009] At present, the state of the art audio systems are capable of recording communication broadcasts. However, a problem with such systems is that a communications system with one tuner can only record one communications channel at any one time. With such systems a listener must determine in advance what channel to record. Moreover, the listener would have to set the system to record a particular channel in advance of the broadcast. These requirements make the state of the art audio systems impractical for random access to audio broadcasts on multiple channels, past and present. [0010] If, however, a method existed to automatically receive and store the communication broadcast, the listener could playback portions of broadcast that were missed. Similarly, if multiple channels could be received and store simultaneously, the listener would not need to be concerned with tuning to a particular communications channel. Further, if the listener is interrupted, the listener could pause the broadcast and resume listening later without missing any portion of the broadcast. Additionally, a user could randomly select any broadcast for playback from the group of broadcasts occurring presently or in the past, subject to practical memory considerations. [0011] Therefore, a need exists for listeners to be able to randomly access broadcasts that have already occurred or are occurring. There is a need for a system for capturing multiple communications channels simultaneously, storing such channels individually, and allowing random access and manipulation of such signals at later times. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION [0012] The present invention is directed to a personal spectrum recorder, e.g. a personal radio recorder that provides random access to broadcasts on multiple channels occurring presently or in the past. The present invention also allows for managing communications content over one or more regions of entire spectrums by receiving, demodulating and processing an entire band, or multiple bands, of communications channels concurrently. The present invention receives wide-band signals, which comprise one or more entire spectrums or radio frequency energy. The present invention extracts communications channels from the wide-band signals and provides for automatic storage for multiple communications channels. The present invention may playback single or multiple channels simultaneously to a number of different output devices. [0013] The system of the present invention comprises a signal acquisition stage, a channel extractor, a file management system, and one or more output stages. The signal acquisition stage receives a wide-band signal from an antenna and converts the wide-band signal into a high-bandwidth digital data stream. The channel extractor converts the high-bandwidth digital data stream into two or more individual channels. The file management system identifies the two or more individual channels according to channel and time. The file management system may also store the two or more individual channels. Storage may be provided by a live pause buffer for the most recent predetermined time-frame of all the channels, and a content archive for longer-term storage. The file management system may the playback one or more individual channels through various output stages. In this manner, one or more users can simultaneously playback different channels through seperate output stages. [0014] In one embodiment of the present invention, the signal acquisition stage comprises an analog signal preconditioner, an analog correction block, a wide-band analog to digital converter ("ADC"), and a digital correction block. The analog signal preconditioning stage amplifies and filters a wide-band signal received from an antenna. Amplification may be achieved through either fixed or variable gain elements, or a combination of both. Control signals for variable gain elements may be provided by external sources. These sources may be generated from measurements of the wide-band signal, a high-bandwidth digital data stream, individual channels, or other sources within the system. [0015] After the analog signal preconditioner, the wide-band signal is sent to the analog correction block. the analog correction block may minimize and remove distortion from the wide-band signal. The analog correction block may also work in conjunction with the digital correction block following the wide-band ADC to provide a dither function. The analog correction block may also measure the wide-band signal and may provide a signal that may be used to control variable gain elements. [0016] Following the analog correction block, the wide-band signal is sent to the wide-band ADC for conversion into a high-bandwidth digital data stream. The high-bandwidth digital data stream is sent to the digital correction block, which removes and minimizes distortion from the high-bandwidth digital data stream. The digital correction block may also measure the high-bandwidth digital data stream and provide a signal that may be used to control variable gain elements. Further, the high-bandwidth digital data stream is sent to the channel extractor. [0017] In an alternative embodiment, the signal acquisition stage may contain multiple sets of processing blocks to achieve the signal acquisition function. For example, one embodiment may have a separate analog signal preconditioner for the amplitude modulated ("AM") band, and a separate analog signal preconditioner for the frequency modulated ("FM") band. In another embodiment, the analog correction function may be performed by separate AM and FM analog correction blocks. These blocks may provide separate gain controls signals for each band, and perform individual signal corrections particular to the band the block is handling. Yet other embodiments may have one ADC for the AM band and another for the FM band. It is noted that any combination of multiple sets of processing blocks may be used in alternative embodiments in order to achieve optimal signal acquisition characteristics. [0018] In one embodiment of the present invention, the channel extractor comprises a channel extractor input interface, a processing block and a channel assembler. The channel extractor input interface accepts the high-bandwidth digital data stream from the signal acquisition stage and selects two or more time domain samples for input to the processing block. The time domain samples may then be multiplied by a window function to correct for distortion introduced by truncated mathematical functions and the presence of non-periodic inputs to the processing block. The processing block converts the two or more time domain samples into one or more frequency domain samples. the channel assembler demodulates and corrects the frequency domain samples, resulting in one or more individual channels. The channel assembler also extracts sub-bands containing data, e.g. metadata, from the stream of individual channels. [0019] In an alternative embodiment, the channel extractor may comprise more than one processor block. Multiple processor blocks may be used to increase throughput. For example, the channel extractor input interface may select several successive sets of time domain data. Each set will be submitted to a separate, but functionally identical processor block for conversion to frequency domain samples. After the processor blocks perform the conversion, the channel assembler will reassemble the frequency domain samples from each successive processor block to form the correct sequence of individual channels. [0020] The file management system may receive the individual channels directly, or the individual channels may first be compressed for more efficient storage. Compression functions may be performed by the parallel compressor. The parallel compressor may compress multiple channels simultaneously, or may use a time division multiplexing scheme where all samples from a given time frame from all the channels in the spectrum are processed through a single parallel compressor in seriatim until all the samples for that given time frame have been processed. Other embodiments may use a combination of parallel and time division multiplexing to achieve various system efficiencies. [0021] The file management system may be couples to various types of storage, both fixed and removable. Fixed storage may be comprised of a live pause buffer and a content archive, among other areas. The individual channels may be sent directly to the live pause buffer upon entry to the file manager. The live pause buffer is a circular time-shift buffer that stores the channel broadcasts as those broadcasts are received. The length of the circular time shift buffer is predetermined. For example, if the predetermined length of the live pause buffer is 2 hours, then broadcasts for the last two hours from the current time will be present in the live pause buffer for all channels in the spectrum. This feature allows the user to navigate the last two hours of programming for all channels by scrolling through the channels and time. Continue reading about Personal spectrum recorder... Full patent description for Personal spectrum recorder Brief Patent Description - Full Patent Description - Patent Application Claims Click on the above for other options relating to this Personal spectrum recorder patent application. ###  How KEYWORD MONITOR works... a FREE service from FreshPatents1. Sign up (takes 30 seconds). 2. Fill in the keywords to be monitored. 3. Each week you receive an email with patent applications related to your keywords. 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