Communication system

• US 20040008737A1
• Filed: 07/10/2002
• Published: 01/15/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 07/10/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Marvell Asia Pte Limited (Marvell Technology Group Limited)
• Original Assignee: SolarFlare Communications Incorporated (Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.)
• Inventors: McClellan, Brett Anthony
• Granted Patent: US 7,133,425 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/535
• CPC Class Codes: H03M 13/256 with trellis coding, e.g. with convolutional codes and TCM
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/0041 Arrangements at the transmitter end
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/006 Trellis-coded modulation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 1/0071 Use of interleaving interleaving per se H03M13/27
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 25/03343 Arrangements at the transmitter end

Abstract

A method and apparatus is disclosed for facilitating high-speed data communication. In one embodiment a receiver is configured to include error correction coding in an interleaved environment to increase data transmission rates. In one embodiment the signal mapping scheme includes constellation shaping to reduce transmit power levels. In one embodiment 8-state Ungerboeck trellis coding is implemented with 4-dimensional PAM10 signal mapping.

Claims

1. A communication system for transmitting data over two or more channels comprising:

a de-multiplexer configured to receive a first number of data streams from a data source and output the a second number of data streams, wherein the second number is greater than the first number;

one or more error correction encoders configured to receive the second number of data streams and perform encoding on the data to create encoded data;

a multiplexer configured to process the encoded data from the one or more error correction encoders and output the encoded data in a third number of data streams; and

one or more mapping modules configured to receive the encoded data from the multiplexer and generate symbol values representative of the encoded data, the symbol values selected from a constellation of available symbol values.

2. The system of claim 1, further including one or more precoders configured to receive the symbol values and process the symbol values to at least partially compensate for the effects of transmission through a channel.

3. The system of claim 2, further including two or more transmit processing modules configured to transmit the symbol values through two or more transmission lines.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more mapping modules comprise mapping modules configured to perform PAM10 mapping on the data.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the constellation of available symbol values comprises a constellation of 10,000 data points, 8192 of which are reserved to represent data.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more error correction encoders comprise 8-state Ungerboeck trellis encoders.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more mapping modules map the data into symbol values selected from a constellation of symbol values that have an average level of zero.

8. A method of processing data prior to transmission over two or more channels to increase the data transmission rate, the method comprising:

receiving a first data stream from a data source;

demultiplexing the first data stream into two or more second data streams;

performing error correction encoding on the two or more second data streams to create two or more encoded data streams;

multiplexing the two or more encoded data streams to create interleaved encoded data streams wherein the number of interleaved encoded data streams is less than the number of encoded data streams; and

modulating the interleaved encoded data streams to convert the interleaved encoded data streams into symbol values on two or more modulator outputs.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the error correction encoding comprises trellis encoding and the modulating comprises modulating the two or more encoded data streams using ten level pulse amplitude modulation.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein the interleaved encoded data stream is comprised of control codes and data and the modulating translates the data and control codes into symbol values.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the symbol values that represent data have an average level of zero.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein the modulating comprises ten value pulse amplitude modulation.

13. A communication system for processing at least one signal received over two or more channels comprising:

one or more equalizers configured to receive at least one signal from the two or more channels and process the at least one signal to reduce the effects of transmission through the two or more channels;

a de-multiplexer configured to receive the at least one signal from the one or more equalizers on a first number of inputs and output at least two signals on a second number of outputs, wherein the second number is greater than the first number;

one or more error correction decoders configured perform decoding on the at least two signals thereby creating at least two decoded signals;

a multiplexer configured to combine the at least two decoded signals into at least one decoded signal; and

one or more demapping modules configured to translate the at least one decoded signal to data.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the de-multiplexer converts four signals into sixteen signals and the multiplexer converts sixteen signals into four signals and wherein the two or more channels comprises four channels, each consisting of two conductors.

15. The system of claim 13, wherein the one or more error correction decoders are configured to decode 8-state Ungerboeck trellis encoded data.

16. The system of claim 13, wherein the one or more demapping modules are configured to map 4D PAM10 symbols into data and control symbols.

17. The system of claim 13, wherein the at least one signal comprises PAM10 symbols.

18. The system of claim 13, wherein the one or more equalizers comprise a feedforward equalizer and a feedback equalizer.

19. A method for processing signals received at a first data rate comprising:

receiving two or more signals via two or more channels;

filtering the two or more signals to reduce the effects of intersymbol interference;

de-interleaving the two or more signals to create three or more signals at a second data rate;

error correction processing the three or more signals to correct errors arising during transmission;

interleaving the three or more signals to create two or more signals at a third data rate;

demodulating the two or more signals to convert the signals to data.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the second data rate is lower than the first data rate and the third data rate is higher than the second data rate.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the signal comprises symbol values and demodulating comprises converting at least one symbol value to data.

22. The method of claim 19, wherein the demodulating comprises mapping the two or more signals to data and control codes.

23. The method of claim 22, wherein the signal comprises a symbol value and the demodulating comprises comparing the two or more signals to a constellation of symbol values to determine if the two or more signals comprise data or a control code.

24. The method of claim 23, wherein the signal comprises ten level pulse amplitude modulated symbol values.

25. A system for achieving data communication between a first location and a second location comprising:

a transmitter comprising;

means for receiving a full rate data stream;

means for time de-interleaving the full rate data stream to two or more fractional rate data streams;

means for performing error correction coding on the two or more fractional rate data streams to create two or more fractional rate encoded data streams;

means for time interleaving the two or more fractional rate encoded data streams into a full rate encoded data stream;

means for mapping the full rate encoded data stream into symbol values;

means for precoding the symbol values;

means for transmitting the precoded symbol values to second location;

a receiver at the second location, configured to receive the symbol values, comprising;

means for filtering the symbol values to compensate for the effects of transmitting to a second location to create a full rate filtered symbol stream;

means for time de-interleaving the symbol values to create a fractional rate filtered symbol stream;

means for decoding the fractional rate filtered symbol stream to create fractional rate decoded symbol stream;

means for time interleaving the fractional rate decoded symbol stream to create full rate decoded symbol stream;

means for demapping the full rate decoded symbol stream to create a full rate demodulated data stream.

26. The system of claim 25, wherein the means for mapping comprises means for mapping the coded data into symbol values reserved for data, wherein the symbol values reserved for data have an average value of zero.

27. The system of claim 26, wherein the symbol values reserved for data comprise 8192 symbol values.

28. The system of claim 25, wherein the error correction coding comprises eight-state Ungerboeck trellis coding and the mapping comprises ten level pulse amplitude modulation.