Abstract: The object of the invention is to provide an acquisition method for a multipoint-to-point CDMA network (NET) that minimizes the influence of the acquisition procedure on the information transmission. The acquisition signals are encoded in a specific acquisition code that differs from the CDMA communication code of the information signals. In addition, the acquisition signals are transmitted with an amplitude smaller than that of the information signals. At the receiving end, the acquisition signals are detected by correlation (11) and subsequent accumulation (12). This method maximizes the transmission capacity of the information signals. In addition, the acquisition time is reduced since adaptive contention-resolving techniques can be employed taking account of the estimated number of colliding terminals (2, 3, 4, 5).

Abstract: A master clock signal generated at the center (1) of a bidirectional point-to-multipoint network is transmitted in the form of time stamps in an MPEG-2 data format over the downstream channel of the network to a plurality of transmitting/receiving facilities (3). Each transmitting/receiving facility (3) derives the clock signal for the upstream channel from the master clock signal and a local clock signal generated by a reference clock (12). The center (1) compares the clock signal from each transmitting/receiving facility with the master clock signal and derives from the result of this comparison digital phase correction information individual to each transmitting/receiving facility (3), which it transmits to the respective transmitting/receiving facility (3) in the MPEG-2 data stream. The respective transmitting/receiving facility (3) uses the phase correction information to control the clock signal for the upstream channel in a numerically controlled oscillator (13).