Small-sized memory cards having a capacity of tens of megabytes have heretofore been used for digital cameras for recording image data obtained by photographing. Such cards include Compact Flash (registered trademark, hereinafter referred to as “CF cards”) and Smart Media (registered trademark, hereinafter referred to as “SM cards”). With the memory card inserted in a memory card connector provided on the camera body, image data as to a plurality of freeze-frame pictures or moving pictures can be recorded on the memory card.
However, the number of images to be recorded on one memory card is limited; many memory cards are necessary for saving a large number of images, so that a cumbersome managing procedure is not only required for memory cards but memory cards need to be handled frequently when a desired image is to be retrieved from among a large number of images, hence the problem of troublesome procedures.
Accordingly, the present applicant has developed an electronic album device of the installed type which is loadable with a memory card and adapted to read all image data recorded on the memory card in response to the depression of a save button by the user and record the read data on a CD-R (Compact Disc-recordable) incorporated in the album device (see JP-A No. 2000-311106). The album device is loadable with two kinds of cards, i.e. CF card and SM card, since these two kinds of cards are available as recording media for digital cameras. Data can be copied between the desired one of the two kinds of memory cards and the CD-R. The electronic album device is adapted to write freeze-frame pictures as recorded on about ten memory cards, to a CD-R having a capacity, for example, of 640 MB. Thus, a large quantity of freeze-frame pictures can be collectively managed by the album device.
In the case where one card medium has been filled with image data by photographing images using a digital data outdoors, it is desirable to copy the image data on the card medium to a CD-R or like disk medium of large capacity by the electronic album device described. If this is possible, there is no need to carry a plurality of card media, hence great convenience. Accordingly, studies are under way to compact the electronic album device for portable use.
Portable electronic album devices are frequently used as driven by a battery, so that attention needs to be directed to the consumption of power. For example when data is to be copied between media with a small capacity remaining in the battery, it is likely that the battery capacity is used up during the copying procedure. In order to judge whether the copying procedure can be executed completely, it is necessary to accurately detect the amount of data to be copied from a transmitting medium to a receiving medium (hereinafter referred to as the “total amount of copy data”) and the capacity of recording area remaining in the receiving medium (hereinafter referred to as the “data recordable capacity”) and to display the result of detection.
The data recordable capacity of the receiving medium can be readily derived from medium management information and is therefore detectable within a short period of time. However, detecting the total amount of copy data on the transmitting medium requires adding up the amounts of data on a plurality of files recorded on the transmitting medium and therefore takes a long period of time. For example, detecting the total amount of data as to thousands of freeze-frame pictures requires at least several minutes. In this case, the user is unable to recognize whether the procedure for detecting the total amount of copy data is being executed normally merely by reference to an access lamp which is turned on to indicate the execution of the detecting procedure. Accordingly there arises the problem that the user must wait for the completion of the detecting process while feeling uneasy.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds