Tonearm control system based on absolute tonearm position

A tonearm drive control device for use in playing a record disc having bands of recorded music separated by non-recorded portions comprising:

• a reversible electric motor;
• a vertical tonearm drive means for vertically moving a tonearm;
• horizontal tonearm drive means responsive to the rotation of said motor to horizontally move said tonearm;
• first detecting means for detecting the position of said tonearm in a horizontal direction with respect to a predetermined reference position and generating a first output in response thereto;
• second detecting means for detecting non-recorded portions of a record disk and generating a second output in response thereto, said second detecting means being mounted on a supporting member moveable with said tonearm and offset from said tonearm in a horizontal direction and aligned with a stylus carried by said tonearm;
• adding means for generating a distance signal representative of the distance in horizontal direction between said second detecting means and said stylus and for adding said distance signal to said first output and generating a third output representative of a position of a band of recorded music in response thereto;
• first memory means receiving said third output from said adding means and operating to store said third output at assigned positions therein in response to an occurrence of said second output, said first memory, in response to an address signal, providing as a memory output the contents of an addressed first memory location;
• selecting means for selecting desired music to be reproduced and generating a selection signal representative of an order of the selected music;
• second memory means receiving said selection signal from said selecting means and generating said address signal in response thereto, said address signal corresponding to the band number of recorded music to be played;
• and
• comparator means for comparing said first output with said memory output;
• wherein said reversible electric motor and both said tonearm drive means are controlled by the outputs of said comparator means.