Data recording/reproducing apparatus of simultaneously performing both reproducing and recording from and in a single recording medium

Apparatus for reproducing audio data comprising a first audio work from a recording medium and essentially simultaneously recording audio data comprising a second audio work on the recording medium, the apparatus comprising:

• a record head;
• a record data compression circuit for compressing audio data-to-be-recorded;
• a first memory connected to the record data compression circuit for storing compressed audio data-to-be-recorded;
• a formatting circuit connected to receive compressed audio data-to-be-recorded from the first memory and to transmit the compressed audio data-to-be-recorded to the record head;
• a read head;
• a de-formatting circuit connected to receive compressed audio data reproduced by the read head;
• a second memory connected to the de-formatting circuit for storing the deformatted and compressed audio data;
• a de-compression circuit connected to the second memory for de-compressing audio data received from the memory;
• a controller which controls the transfer of audio data into and from the first memory and the second memory, whereby audio data read is read out of the first memory at a first transfer rate and stored in the second memory at the first transfer rate, and whereby audio data is read out of the second memory at a second transfer rate and stored in the first memory at the second transfer rate, the second transfer rate being lower than the first transfer rate, and which repetitively alternates the reading out of audio data comprising the second audio work from the first memory and the storing of audio data comprising the first audio work in the second memory.