JP2001229352A - Memory card cartridge, its setting device, and memory card setting system - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To make the capacity of a recording medium large with a simple constitution. SOLUTION: Plural memory cards 1 are stored in a memory card cartridge 11 so that they can be replaced, and when this memory card cartridge 11 is set in a setting device for exclusive use, plural memory cards 1 are partially or entirely electrically connected to the setting device side by a connector 35 so that all connected memory cards can be simultaneously accessed.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a memory card cartridge for accommodating a plurality of memory cards as recording media, a device for mounting the same, and a memory card mounting system.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, as a method for increasing the capacity of a recording medium, a method of accommodating a plurality of recording media in one package or cartridge has been adopted. In this case, the recording capacity is increased several times by the number of stored recording media.

Conventionally, for example, US Pat. No. 5,396,475 discloses an example of a disk magazine in which a plurality of disk-shaped recording media are detachably stored. Further, for example, US Pat. No. 4,489,351 shows an example of a memory unit in which a plurality of semiconductor memories are detachably stored.

[0004]

However, in the example of U.S. Pat. No. 5,396,475, in order to read out one of a plurality of stored disks, each disk is pulled out from a disk magazine, and a disk drive and reading device is used. Since it must be attached to
For reading, there is a problem in that the disk must be moved in the disk magazine, and only one disk moved further can be read.

In US Pat. No. 4,489,351,
There are connectors on the memory unit for obtaining electrical continuity with multiple semiconductor memories, wiring on the memory unit, and connectors for obtaining electrical continuity with the main unit. There is a problem that the structure is complicated and the cost is high.

The present invention has been made to solve such a problem.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention relates to a memory card cartridge for accommodating a plurality of memory cards, which has a substantially rectangular shape and allows the memory cards to be exchanged from one side. It is another object of the present invention to provide a memory card cartridge having a structure and a structure in which a memory card can be electrically connected from the other surface opposing the one surface. Further, the present invention relates to a mounting device for a memory card cartridge in which a memory card cartridge accommodating a plurality of memory cards is configured to be detachable and configured to be able to write and / or read data from and to the memory card. It is an object of the present invention to provide a mounting device for a memory card cartridge which is configured to be electrically connected to a part or all of a plurality of memory cards by a connector when the memory card is inserted.

In such a configuration of the present invention, the memory card cartridge accommodates a plurality of memory cards, but has no electrical parts in the cartridge.
The structure is simple. When the memory card cartridge is mounted on the mounting device, some or all of the plurality of memory cards are electrically connected to the mounting device by connectors, so that all the memory cards connected without moving the memory card in the cartridge are connected. It becomes possible to access the memory card at the same time.

[0009]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described below in detail with reference to the drawings.

First, a memory card will be described with reference to FIG. The memory card 1 is a large-capacity recording medium called a memory stick, and has a memory of several MB to several tens MB built in a card body 2 formed in a rectangular thin plate shape as a whole. Is used by inserting the memory card 1 into a slot of an electronic device such as a personal computer or a digital camera.

A terminal portion 3 is provided at the end of a card body 2 of the memory card 1. When the memory card 1 is inserted into a slot of an electronic device, the terminal portion 3 is provided.
Is electrically connected to the contact piece on the electronic device side, and data writing / reading is performed. Reference numerals 4 and 5 denote recesses for positioning, 6 a label attaching area, and 7 a protect switch for preventing erroneous erasure.

FIGS. 2 to 5 show a first embodiment of a memory card cartridge according to the present invention in which a plurality of such memory cards 1 are stored. FIG. 2 is a perspective view of the memory card cartridge, FIG. 3 is a perspective view of the inverted state, FIG. 4 is a longitudinal sectional view showing the internal structure, and FIG. 5 is a perspective view showing the state of replacing the memory card.

The memory card cartridge 11 is made of, for example, PS (polystyrene), ABS (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene), PC (polycarbonate).
This is made of a hard plastic material such as a cartridge body 12, a rear lid 14 attached to the rear side of the cartridge main body 12, and a front lid of the cartridge main body 12 opposed to the rear lid 14. The front cover 18 forms a substantially rectangular housing as a whole. Here, the material of the memory card cartridge 11 may be formed by adding carbon or the like to the above-mentioned plastic material. In this case, conductivity is generated by adding carbon, and the internal memory card can be protected from destruction due to static electricity.

The cartridge body 12 is formed in the shape of a rectangular tube having openings on the front and rear surfaces, and a plurality of (four in this example) memory cards 1 can be housed in the interior thereof in a state of being arranged in a vertical direction. It has become. That is, FIG.
As shown in FIG. 3, a pair of concave grooves 13a, 13a, which face the inner surfaces of both side surfaces 12a, 12b, are formed inside the cartridge body 12.
The memory card 1 is housed and held in the cartridge body 12 in a state where both sides are guided by the concave grooves 13a and 13b, respectively.

The memory card 1 has a cartridge body 1 with its front end (terminal 3 side) facing the front cover 18 side.
When the memory card 1 is stored in the cartridge main body 12, the concave portions 4 and 5 of the memory card 1 are provided with protrusions (not shown) provided in the cartridge main body 12. By engaging with
The memory card 1 is firmly fixed and held so as not to move in the cartridge body 12.

The rear cover 14 covers the opening on the rear surface side of the cartridge main body 12, and is attached to the cartridge main body 12 so as to be openable and closable with the lower shaft 15 as a fulcrum. As shown in FIG. With the cover 14 opened, the memory card 1 is inserted through the opening on the rear side of the cartridge body 12.
Can be exchanged by taking in and out.

In a state where the rear cover 14 is closed,
The rear lid 14 is fixedly held in this state by engaging the concave portion 17 on the rear lid 14 with the convex portion 16 on the cartridge body 12 side.

The rear lid 14 is made of a transparent or translucent plastic, so that the memory card 1 inside the cartridge can be visually checked by passing through from the outside.

On the other hand, the front cover 18 covers an opening on the front side of the cartridge main body 12 and is attached to the cartridge main body 12 so as to be freely opened and closed with a lower shaft portion 19 as a fulcrum. It is kept closed by a predetermined biasing means not shown.

When the memory card cartridge 11 is mounted in a dedicated mounting device as described later, the front cover 18 is opened to expose the front end of the memory card 1 from the front side of the cartridge body 12, and the terminal portion 3 is mounted. It is electrically connected to the device side.

The memory card cartridge 11
On both side surfaces of the front cover 18, notched guide grooves 20 are formed in the horizontal direction from both side edge portions 18 a and 18 b of the front lid 18 to the center portion of both side surface portions 12 a and 12 b of the cartridge body 12. The guide groove 20 is a portion serving as an insertion guide when the memory card cartridge 11 is mounted on a dedicated mounting device.

Further, the bottom portion 12 of the cartridge body 12
c, two positioning recesses 21 are formed at the front and rear, so that when the memory card cartridge 11 is mounted on a dedicated mounting device, the memory card cartridge 11 can be accurately positioned in the positioning recess 21. It has become.

The upper surface 12d of the cartridge body 12
Has a concave mark 22 with an arrow mark 22 indicating the direction of insertion into the mounting device and a label area 23 for attaching a label.
A plurality of small holes 24 are formed to make it easy to put a finger when opening the rear cover 14.

FIG. 6 shows a second example of the memory card cartridge.
In other words, the memory card cartridge 11 of this embodiment has a structure in which a plurality of memory cards 1 are stored in a state of being vertically arranged in a horizontal direction.

Next, a loading device to which a memory card cartridge according to the present invention is loaded will be described with reference to FIGS. This loading device 31 is a device for writing / reading data to / from the memory card 1 in the memory card cartridge 11, and is provided with a slot 32 for detachably attaching the memory card cartridge 11 as shown in FIG. That is, when the memory card cartridge 11 is mounted, the memory card cartridge 1 is inserted into the slot 32 from the front cover 18 side.
1 is inserted and loaded, and when the memory card cartridge 11 is to be removed, the memory card cartridge 11 is pulled out from the slot 32 and taken out.

On the inner side of the slot 32, the guide grooves 20 on both sides of the memory card cartridge 11 are provided.
The guide rail 33 has a function of engaging with the guide groove 20 when the memory card cartridge 11 is inserted to reliably guide the memory card cartridge 11 to a predetermined mounting position. In addition, it also has a function of preventing erroneous insertion of the memory card cartridge 11.

That is, when the memory card cartridge 11 is inserted into the slot 32 in the formal direction from the front lid 18 side, the guide groove 20 is engaged with the guide rail 33 from the front lid 18 side, and the memory card cartridge 11 is Inserts smoothly, but memory card cartridge 1
1 is inserted in the slot 32 from the rear lid 14 side, the rear lid 14 is hooked on the guide rail 33 to prevent the memory card cartridge 11 from being inserted. Incorrect insertion will be prevented.

Further, on the inner surface side of the slot 32, the positioning recess 21 in the bottom portion of the memory card cartridge 11 is formed.
When the memory card cartridge 11 is inserted into the slot 32 and mounted, the positioning projection 34 engages with the positioning recess 21 of the memory card cartridge 11, whereby the memory card cartridge 11 is engaged. Cartridge 11 is slot 3
2 is accurately positioned at a predetermined mounting position.

When the memory card cartridge 11 is mounted in the slot 32, the front cover 18 is automatically opened by a cover opening mechanism provided inside the mounting device 31, and the front opening of the cartridge body 12 is opened. The tip of the memory card 1 is exposed.

FIGS. 11 and 12 show an example of a cover opening mechanism for opening the front cover. Here, reference numeral 51 denotes a lid opening lever constituting a lid opening mechanism, which is made of a highly rigid wire such as a piano wire or a stainless steel wire for a spring. As shown in FIG. 12, the opening lever 51 has an end portion 51a bent into an L-shape and a central portion serving as a coil portion 51b.
Further, the base 51c is formed in a torsion coil shape so that the mounting device 3
1, is rotatably mounted on a fixed shaft 52, and has a base end 51d fixed to determine the position in the rotation direction.

When the memory card cartridge 11 is inserted into the slot of the loading device 31, the tip 51a of the opening lever 51 enters the opening groove 18c provided in the front cover 18 of the memory card cartridge 11, and When the memory card cartridge 11 is further inserted in this state, a downward moment is applied to the front cover 18 by the cover opening lever 51 as shown in FIGS. 11B and 12B, and the front cover 18 is opened. In this case, the lid opening lever 51
By bending the coil portion 51b, the memory card cartridge 11 can be inserted further in the state where the front cover 18 is open. Note that this lid opening mechanism is not limited to a wire rod, and may be a link mechanism using a sheet metal or the like.

When the front cover 18 is opened and the leading end of the memory card 1 is exposed, the connector 3 disposed inside the mounting device 31 as shown in FIGS.
5, all the memory cards 1 in the memory card cartridge 11 are simultaneously electrically connected to the mounting device 31 side.

That is, the connector 35 has a plurality of memory cards 1 stored in the memory card cartridge 11.
Each of the contact pieces 36 is in contact with a corresponding one of the terminal portions 3 of the memory card 1 to be electrically connected to the corresponding one of the memory cards 1, thereby simultaneously writing / reading data to / from all the memory cards 1. The circuit can be accessed.

In the system according to the present invention as described above, the memory card cartridge 11 containing a plurality of memory cards 1 can be handled as one large-capacity recording medium, so that the recording capacity can be easily increased. It becomes possible.

By the way, the memory card cartridge 1
In the state in which the memory card cartridge 1 is mounted in the slot 32, the rear part of the memory card cartridge 11 projects from the mounting device 31 as shown in FIG. The memory card 1 may be opened and replaced. This is convenient, for example, when taking out a recorded memory card while recording on another memory card and replacing it with an unrecorded memory card.

In the examples shown in FIGS. 8 and 9, all the memory cards in the memory card cartridge are simultaneously connected by the connector. May be connected only to the connector. In this case, the memory card not connected to the connector can be conveniently stored in a memory card cartridge as a spare.

In this embodiment, the memory card cartridge 11 is manually mounted on the mounting device 31. However, the present invention is not limited to this. For example, a front loading type cassette mounting device of a video cassette recorder, a video cassette recorder, or the like can be used. A mechanism such as a pop-up type cassette mounting device of a camera may be adopted to automatically mount a memory card cartridge. In this case, for example, VHS
A lid such as a lid for a type video cassette, VHS-C type video cassette or 8 mm video cassette and a lock mechanism for the front lid are provided. When the memory card cartridge is mounted on the mounting device, the lock is automatically performed. The front lid is released and opened. Also, in this structure, the connector may be fixed in the mounting device and connected by moving the memory card cartridge, or the connector may be moved and connected after the memory card cartridge is mounted. Is also good.

In the present memory card cartridge, the front cover and the rear cover are provided. However, the gist of the present invention is as described in claim 1, and the front cover and / or the rear cover may not be provided. However, the front cover protects the memory card terminals from dust and dirt, or prevents careless contact with your fingertips.The rear cover also prevents dust and dirt from entering the cartridge, Since the function of preventing the memory card from being taken out carelessly is provided, it is ideal to adopt a configuration in which a front cover and a rear cover are provided as in this example.

FIG. 10 shows an example in which the system according to the present invention is applied to a personal computer. The personal computer 41 is a so-called tower type personal computer, 42 is a computer main body, 43 is a display device, 44 is a keyboard device,
45 is a mouse.

The computer body 42 has a CD-ROM
The mounting device 31 according to the present invention is incorporated together with the drive device 46 and the floppy disk drive device 47, and the memory card cartridge 11 containing a plurality of memory cards can be inserted and mounted in the slot 32 of the mounting device 31. ing.

In this example, a memory card is used as an external recording medium of a personal computer. By applying the system according to the present invention to this, it is possible to easily cope with a further increase in the capacity of the external recording medium of the personal computer. It is.

Although a personal computer has been described as an example this time, the present invention is not limited to this, but may be a memory such as a digital camera, a portable audio reproducing or recording device, and a telephone. Needless to say, it can be mounted on various electronic devices that require the.

[0043]

As apparent from the above description, in the structure of the present invention, the memory card cartridge accommodates a plurality of memory cards, but the cartridge has no electric parts, so that the structure is simple and low. Can be provided at cost. When the memory card cartridge is mounted on the mounting device, a plurality of memory cards are electrically connected to the mounting device by connectors.
It is possible to simultaneously access all the connected memory cards without moving the memory card in the cartridge, and it is possible to easily cope with an increase in the capacity of the recording medium.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is an example of a memory card, (A) is a perspective view thereof, and (B) is a perspective view of a turned upside down state.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view showing a first embodiment of a memory card cartridge according to the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of the same turned over.

FIG. 4 is a longitudinal sectional view showing the internal structure of the same.

FIG. 5 is a perspective view showing a state in which the memory card is being replaced.

FIG. 6 is a perspective view showing a second embodiment of the memory card cartridge according to the present invention.

7A and 7B are perspective views of a memory card cartridge mounting device according to the present invention, wherein FIG. 7A shows a state before the memory card cartridge is mounted, and FIG. 7B shows a state after the memory card cartridge is mounted.

FIG. 8 is a side view showing a state where a plurality of memory cards in a memory card cartridge are simultaneously electrically connected to the mounting device side by connectors in the mounting device according to the present invention.

FIG. 9 is a perspective view of the same.

FIG. 10 is a perspective view showing an example in which the system according to the present invention is applied to a personal computer.

FIGS. 11A and 11B are side views showing an example of the lid opening mechanism, wherein FIG. 11A shows a state before the front lid is opened, and FIG. 11B shows a state where the memory card cartridge is mounted and the front lid is opened.

12A and 12B are perspective views of the main part, in which FIG. 12A shows a state before the front lid is opened, and FIG. 12B shows a state in which the front lid is opened.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 memory card, 3 terminal section, 11 memory card cartridge, 12 cartridge body, 1
4 ‥‥ rear lid, 18 ‥‥ front lid, 31 ‥‥ mounting device, 32 ‥
‥ Slot, 35 ‥‥ connector, 36 ‥‥ piece

Continued on the front page (72) Inventor Yoshihiko Nakamura 6-7-35 Kita-Shinagawa, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo Inside Sony Corporation (72) Inventor Yumiko Honma 6-35-35 Kita-Shinagawa, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo Sony Stock In-company (72) Inventor Naoki Kamagaya 6-35, Kita-Shinagawa, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo Sony Corporation F-term (reference) 5B035 AA01 BA09 BB09 BC00 CA08 5B058 CA13 KA24 YA20

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A memory card cartridge for accommodating a plurality of memory cards, wherein said memory card cartridge has a substantially rectangular shape, said memory card is replaceable from one side, and said memory card is inserted from another side facing said one side. A memory card cartridge characterized in that it can be electrically connected to a memory card cartridge. 2. A mounting device for a memory card cartridge, wherein a memory card cartridge containing a plurality of memory cards is configured to be detachable, and is configured to be able to write and / or read data from and to the memory card. A memory card cartridge mounting device configured to be electrically connected to a part or all of the plurality of memory cards by a connector when the memory card is mounted. 3. A memory card cartridge accommodating a plurality of memory cards, a mounting device for the memory card cartridge configured to be detachable from the memory card cartridge and configured to be able to write and / or read from and to the memory card, The memory card cartridge has a substantially rectangular shape, is configured so that the memory card can be exchanged from one side, and has a structure capable of electrically connecting the memory card from the other side facing the one side. A memory card mounting system, wherein when the memory card cartridge is mounted on the mounting device, a part or all of the plurality of memory cards are electrically connected to the mounting device by connectors.