A method for writing streaming audiovisual data to a disk drive is performed
by
organizing the data into clusters and commencing writing the clusters to the first
physical sector encountered after the read/write head has settled to the desired
track on the rotating disk. A cluster contains a number of data blocks corresponding
to the number of physical sectors in an integer number of tracks on the disk, so
that the writing of a single cluster is the writing to an integer number of full
tracks on the disk. Even though the disk drive may have a physical index to identify
the first physical sector in all the tracks, the writing of cluster data takes
place without regard to index position. During interleaving of audiovisual data,
when multiple recording tasks are cycled until all the tasks are completed, the
clusters in the first portion of the first task are written during the first interleave
period, the head is then positioned to another track where the clusters in the
first portion of the second task are written during the next interleave period,
beginning with the first physical sector encountered by the head, again without
waiting for index. The location where the first block of cluster data has been
written is identified by writing a block number into the physical sector or by
writing a start of cluster indicator on the track where the cluster is written.
