Patent · US Expired

Holding automatic gain control levels during read error recovery in a disc drive

US6055118A · kind A · utility

10Cited by
9References
12Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventor

Key dates

Filing dateMay 30, 1997
Grant dateApr 25, 2000
Priority date
Expiry dateMay 30, 2017

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG11B20/10009
  • WIPO fieldAudio-visual technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

An apparatus and associated method are disclosed for recovering user data from a data block in a disc drive in which user data are stored by way of a plurality of blocks on tracks of a disc, the blocks including data blocks in which the user data are stored in predefined increments. A head generates readback signals from the blocks and a read channel reconstructs the user data from the readback signals. An automatic gain control stage establishes a gain used to amplify the readback signal to a level suitable for use by the read channel. When an uncorrected read error is detected, the disc drive proceeds to read a previous block sequentially preceding the affected data block and sets the gain to a fixed value based upon the readback signals determined from the previous block. The fixed value of gain is then used to recover the user data from the affected data block.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.