Video storage and delivery apparatus and method

摘要

In a video storage and delivery apparatus (102-105) and a video storage and delivery system (Fig. 1), video data items are simultaneously supplied to a plurality of users (170, 172) while guaranteeing the time axis and the picture quality of the video data. The apparatus includes a frame address table (1408) which indicates a storage location in the apparatus of each frame of video data to start a special reproduction or a reproduction at a desired frame and a control unit (161) controlling a switch bus (140) connecting a plurality of video storage and delivery apparatuses to a plurality of channels so as to conduct data transfers via the switch bus between the apparatuses and between video reproduction devices of the users. From an optical disk data storage storing video data, a plurality of video data items are read in a timesharing fashion to be temporarily stored in a magnetic disk device or a semiconductor memory, thereby delivering the video data items therefrom to the users.