KR20030072533A - Repair apparatus for system software of digital television and repair method thereof - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for recovering a system software of a digital television. The method for recovering a system software of a conventional digital television is provided to viewers who have experienced the stability of analog home appliances for a long time by resetting the digital television itself when an abnormality occurs in the system software. Lack of understanding of the problems arising from the specificity of digital products with a high proportion of software can reduce the reliability of the product itself. In view of the above problems, the present invention provides a microcomputer for discontinuing the use of the system bus and controlling each unit to reproduce broadcast signals in case of abnormality in the system software; Including a central processing unit which resets and recovers the system software when an error occurs in the system software, even when an error occurs in the system software, the broadcasting signal is continuously reproduced by using a microcomputer. By restoring the system software by resetting, there is an effect of improving the reliability of the product by restoring the system software in a state where the user is not aware of an abnormality in the digital television.

Description

REPAIR APPARATUS FOR SYSTEM SOFTWARE OF DIGITAL TELEVISION AND REPAIR METHOD THEREOF

The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for recovering a system software of a digital television, and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for recovering a system software for a digital television without rebooting the digital television and suitable for recovering an error of the system software without a user's knowledge. It is about.

In general, with the development of digital television, not only the reception of digital broadcasting, which is a basic operation, but also more advanced functions such as a personal video recorder (PVR) system, a data broadcasting reception function, and an interactive television combined with a hard disk are being implemented.

In this case, in order to use the advanced functions, the weight of the operating system or software becomes very high. In other words, digital televisions operate with more than 500,000 lines of software code, which is comparable to that of general desktop computers.

Generally, a system error occurs on a desktop computer, and a fatal system error occurs on a representative operating system, Windows, and a blue screen is displayed to inform the user of an error.

When the blue screen is displayed, the user cannot take any action and reboots the system for normal operation.

Likewise, digital television with a high proportion of software also causes a system error, and the viewer must reboot the digital television by turning the digital television off and on again.

At this time, the digital broadcast cannot be viewed during the reboot.

This is a lack of understanding of the problems arising from the specialty of digital products with a large proportion of software for viewers who have experienced stability of analog home appliances for a long time, which may lower the reliability of the product itself.

In addition, since the user judged that the product is defective, repair requests, inquiries, etc. are expected to increase to the manufacturer, and there is a problem that after-sales management of the product is not easy.

Disclosure of the Invention The present invention has been made in view of the problems of the conventional digital television, and an object thereof is to provide an apparatus and method for recovering a system software of a digital television which can recover a faulty software in a state in which the viewer does not recognize it.

1 is a block diagram of a system software recovery apparatus for a digital television of the present invention.

2 is a flowchart of a system software recovery method of the digital television of the present invention.

3 is a flowchart of a process of stopping display of an on-screen display.

4 is a system software error processing flowchart of the microcomputer.

Fig. 5 is a processing flowchart of the remote controller received signal of the microcomputer.

6 is a system initialization flowchart of the digital television of the present invention.

* Description of the symbols for the main parts of the drawings *

1: Tuner 2: MPEG-2 Decoder

3: AC-3 Decoder 4: Audio Output

5: video output unit 6: infrared receiver unit

7: Reset part

The above object is achieved by selectively resetting only the central processing unit using the system software to restore the system software while reproducing the broadcast signal so that the user does not recognize it. The present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. The explanation is as follows.

1 is a configuration diagram of a system software recovery apparatus of a digital television of the present invention, and a tuner 1 for selecting and receiving a broadcast signal applied through an antenna ANT as shown therein; A modulation unit VSB for selecting valid data TPDATA among broadcast signals received through the tuner 1; An MPEG-2 decoder 2 receiving and decoding data TP DATA of the modulation unit VSB; An AC-3 decoder (3) for receiving and decoding data from the MPEG-2 decoder (2); An audio output unit 4 for receiving an output of the AC-3 decoder 3 and outputting an audio signal; A video output unit (5) which receives and processes the video output signal of the MPEG-2 decoder (2) to display video; A ferroelectric memory (FRAM) for storing system software when the digital television is not powered; A microcomputer MICOM that receives the viewer's control through the infrared receiver 6 and outputs a control signal corresponding thereto; Each unit is controlled according to the control signal of the microcomputer MICOM, and the CPU is configured to continuously receive, display, and reset the system when an error occurs in the system software.

In addition, a power button (POWER) that can be turned on / off by the user's arbitrary control, and includes a reset unit 7 for resetting the digital television by the user's control or the operation of the microcomputer (MICOM). It is configured by.

An embodiment of the present invention having such a configuration will be described in more detail.

First, in normal operation, the user turns on the digital television by controlling the remote controller or the power button (POWER).

In this state, the CPU performs a booting process, and when the booting is completed, the CPU performs an operation of controlling each unit.

In the broadcast signal received through the antenna ANT according to the operations of the CPU and the I2C control unit 8, the tuner 1 selects a broadcast signal of a specific channel, which is used to select a modulation unit VSB. It is modulated and output as valid data (TP DATA).

Then, the MPEG-2 decoder 2 receiving the valid data TP DATA decodes the valid data TP DATA to generate an audio signal and a video signal, and the audio signal is an AC-3 decoder 3. After decoding, the audio output unit 4 converts the analog signal into an analog signal and outputs the video signal. The video output unit 5 receiving the video signal of the MPEG-2 decoder 2 amplifies the video signal and displays it on the screen. do.

The above operation is a basic operation of the digital television, and even in the course of performing such an operation, communication between the microcomputer MICOM and the central processing unit CPU, which has received the user's control reputation through the infrared receiver 6, is performed. You can perform other functions you want.

In this state, when an abnormal reset occurs, i.e., when a reset occurs due to a user's remote controller misoperation or the like during normal operation, the microcomputer MICOM that receives this input receives an input from the infrared receiver 6. Block it.

Then, the operation of the I2C control unit 7 is stopped to block the generation of the I2C signal provided to each unit.

Then, the data stored last in the ferroelectric memory (FRAM) is read through the I2C bus connected to the microcomputer MICOM to check the state of each part constituting the digital television.

In this test, if there is an abnormality in each unit, the unit is reset. At this time, the digital television unit performs the operation of the unit which performs the most basic functions so as to output video and sound, and boots the central processing unit.

An example of the above operation is an example in which an abnormal reset occurs, and when an abnormality occurs in the system software, the central processing unit (CPU) generates an abnormal detection signal (ABNORMAL INDICATOR) signal.

Next, the microcomputer MICOM, which has received the abnormal detection signal ABNORMAL INDICATIOR of the CPU, outputs a reset control signal RESET_OUT to the reset control unit 7 so that the reset control unit 7 receives the reset control unit 7. Reset signal RESET is output.

This is not at the request of the user, and is a reset signal generated by itself according to an abnormality of the system software, and thus is different from the reset at the request of the user.

Next, the CPU receiving the reset signal RESET is reset.

At this time, the microcomputer MICOM cuts off the input from the infrared receiver 6 and controls the I2C controller 8 to receive a broadcast signal and maintain an operation of reproducing audio and video of the broadcast signal. .

As a result, the system software of the central processing unit (CPU) in which the error has occurred is normalized by a reset operation. When the CPU is rebooted, the microcomputer MICOM according to the booting completion signal BOOTING OK is performed. ) Processes the user control signal input from the infrared receiver 6.

As described above, the present invention resets the central processing unit (CPU) using the system software in the event of abnormal system software, thereby restoring the abnormality of the system software and continuously playing the broadcast signal during the restoration period, thereby recognizing the user. You can restore the system software without doing so.

Fig. 2 is a flowchart showing a system software recovery method of the digital television of the present invention summarizing the operation of the present invention as described above. After turning on the system as shown in FIG. Steps; In the normal operation stage, it is determined whether or not a reset command has occurred at the request of the user. If the reset command has occurred, the user cannot control the digital television using the remote control, and reads the final data of the ferroelectric memory. A user reset step of checking a state and resetting some devices and maintaining reproduction of a broadcast signal; When an abnormality occurs in the system software, the microcomputer detects this, resets the central processing unit by generating a reset signal, and performs an automatic reset step of controlling the reproduction of the broadcast signal.

As described above, the operation process when the reset occurs by the user and the operation when the reset occurs due to an error in the system software are different in that a reset signal is forcibly generated by using an internal circuit. The same process can be performed by the microcomputer MICOM which outputs a control signal using data of the ferroelectric memory while the processing unit CPU is reset.

In the digital television, when a transport stream, which is a broadcast signal, is input, decoding and playing the received stream is performed in a series of operations without interference from the CPU, so even while the CPU is reset. The broadcast signal can be reproduced continuously.

In order to perform the above process, the processing of another input signal must be stopped while the CPU is reset, and the display of the on-screen display (OSD) or the like must also be terminated.

The display of the on-screen display should be stopped because the on-screen display is stopped while the CPU is reset, and an abnormality may occur in the state of the screen.

The process of stopping the display of the on-screen display is shown in the flowchart of FIG. 3.

If an abnormality has occurred in the system software by detecting the state of the central processing unit (CPU), the graphic controller (GRAPHIC CONTROLLER) is cleared, and if the on-screen display is currently being displayed, the display of the on-screen display is stopped.

Then, in order to perform error processing of the CPU, the GPIO (GENERAL PERPHOSE I / O) terminal is fixed to the output of the low potential, and the CPU is notified of the occurrence of the error. Reset the central processing unit.

When the GPIO terminal is fixed at a low potential, the CPU recognizes that a recovery is necessary due to a system error, and performs a process of defining a state of each bus.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of a state processing procedure of the microcomputer MICOM. As shown in FIG. 4, when the GPIO terminal is in a low potential state, the state of the central processing unit (CPU) is directly checked and, if there is an error, the system software. If it is in error recovery operation, clear the busy bit of I2C bus and reset the I2C bus.

Then, the unused flag of the I2C bus is cleared.

In addition, if the state of the CPU is normal, it is determined whether an error recovery operation is in progress. If the error recovery is in progress, the process ends. If the error recovery is not in progress, the busy bit of the I2C bus is set and an error recovery flag is set.

Through the above process, the microcomputer MICOM can control the bus according to the state of the central processing unit (CPU) and the state of the system software.

The reason why the I2C bus cannot be used as described above is to prevent other controllers from malfunctioning when the I2C bus becomes congested while the CPU is reset, and do not use the I2C bus. Instead, video and audio can be played back according to the operation of the microcomputer MICOM.

In addition, the microcomputer MICOM must process the signal of the remote controller received by the infrared receiver 6 while the system software is restored.

In other words, while the system software is being restored, the user cannot recognize that an error has occurred in the system software because the broadcast signal is being reproduced on the digital television. Therefore, the user can operate the remote controller, but if the system software is restarted, Since the operation cannot be processed, when an infrared signal is detected by the infrared receiver 6 as shown in FIG. 5 below, it is determined whether an error recovery is currently performed, and if the error recovery is being performed, the infrared signal is ignored and an error is detected. If not, the electronic signal corresponding to the infrared signal is transmitted to the CPU.

During error recovery by the operation of the microprocessor, the infrared signal, which is a user's remote control signal, is blocked.

6 is a flowchart illustrating a system initialization operation of the present invention. As shown in FIG. 6, when the system is rebooted, a state of a GPIO terminal is checked to determine whether an error recovery state is booting or normal booting. Checking the state of each device if the error recovery state is in operation, and recovering and clearing the state of the GPIO terminal if all devices have no error; Initializing an I2C bus and initializing each unit in the case of the normal booting; After clearing the GPIO terminal or initializing each unit, the memory map and the message queue are initialized, the task is executed, and then the main task is executed.

That is, when only the central processing unit is initialized, only the problem part is restored without performing initialization of each unit.

Through the above process, in case of abnormality in the system software, the digital television maintains the operation of the part related to the reproduction of the video signal by using a microprocessor, and resets only the central processing unit using the system software. The error of the system software can be repaired so that the error of the system software can be repaired without the user's knowledge.

As described above, the apparatus and method for recovering system software of the digital television of the present invention continuously reproduces a broadcast signal using a microcomputer even when an error occurs in the system software, and restores the system software by resetting only the central processing unit in the reproduction state. As a result, the system software can be restored in a state where the user does not recognize that an abnormality has occurred in the digital television, thereby improving the reliability of the product.

Claims (6)

A microcomputer which stops using the system bus and reproduces broadcast signals by controlling each unit when an abnormality occurs in the system software; And a central processing unit for resetting the system software and restoring the system software when an abnormality occurs in the system software. The system of claim 1, wherein when the system software detects an abnormality, the microcomputer stops using the system bus, stops displaying the on-screen display, and blocks the user's remote controller control signal detected by the infrared receiver. System software recovery device for a digital television, characterized in that. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the microcomputer reproduces a broadcast signal using data stored in a ferroelectric memory that stores a recent state of the digital television. A normal operation step of displaying a broadcast if there is no reset command of the user; In the normal operation stage, it is determined whether or not a reset command has occurred at the request of the user. If the reset command is generated, the user cannot control the digital television using the remote control, and read the final data of the ferroelectric memory to read the state of each part. A user reset step of resetting some of the devices and maintaining reproduction of the broadcast signal; When an abnormality occurs in the system software, the microcomputer detects this, resets the central processing unit by generating a reset signal, and automatically resets the digital television. How to recover system software. The digital television system according to claim 4, wherein when an error occurs in the system software, if the on-screen display is currently being displayed, the display of the on-screen display is stopped and the automatic reset step is performed. How to recover software. The method of claim 4, wherein the microcomputer blocks the infrared input signal of the remote controller in the process of performing the automatic reset step.