The tuner 941 extracts a signal in a desired channel from a broadcast signal received through an antenna (not depicted), and demodulates the extracted signal. Then, the tuner 941 outputs a coded bit stream obtained by the demodulation to the selector 946. In other words, the tuner 941 serves the role as transmitting means in the recording and reproducing apparatus 940.
The external interface 942 is an interface for connecting the recording and reproducing apparatus 94 to an external device or a network. For example, the external interface 942 may be an IEEE1394 interface, a network interface, a USB interface, a flash memory interface, or the like, for example. For example, video data and audio data received via the external interface 942 are input to the encoder 943. In other words, the external interface 942 serves the role as transmitting means in the recording and reproducing apparatus 94.
In case video data and audio data input from the external interface 942 have not been coded, the encoder 943 codes the video data and the audio data. Then, the encoder 943 outputs coded bit streams to the selector 946.
The HDD 944 records coded bit streams where contents data such as video data and audio data are compressed, various programs, and other data in an internal hard disk. Furthermore, the HDD 944 reads these data from the hard disk when video pictures and sounds are to be reproduced.
The disk drive 945 records data in and reads data from a recording medium inserted therein. The recording medium inserted in the disk drive 945 may be a DVD disk (DVD-Video, DVD-RAM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, etc. a Blu-ray (registered trademark), or the like, for example.