Abstract: Interleaving methods and apparatus are disclosed for an in-band on-channel digital audio broadcasting system. The guard periods that separate any two adjacent symbols in a conventional OFDM system can provide a mechanism for OFDM frame synchronization. The guard period of successive OFDM frames is utilized to establish one or more unique positive or negative patterns and thereby provide a mechanism for interleaver synchronization. By proper positioning of the guard period patterns, one or more particular portions of each interleaver block are identified, such as the beginning and midpoint of each interleaver block. The present invention identifies the beginning of each interleaver block, for example, by positioning the fourth negative cyclic prefix with OFDM frame zero (0). The present invention can optionally identify the midpoint of each interleaver block, for example, by positioning the fourth negative cyclic prefix with OFDM frame 206.

Abstract: An OFDM receiver recovers an rf signal as in-phase (I) and quadrature phase (Q) components of a baseband signal sampled in an A/D converter. The I and Q components of a received symbol are correlated at all sampling points. Correlation values are averaged over the latest L frames and saved in an L-deep FIFO. Symbol amplitude and phase are computed and passed to an offset estimator and an OFDM frame synchronization estimator. A phase-locked loop oscillator provides a sample number identifying the OFDM frame boundary to the offset estimator. An estimated offset value is selected as the negative of the phase angle of the auto correlation.

Abstract: A frame formatting technique for filling a fixed length master frame with a number of variable length frames and adding additional data to synchronize the individual variable length frames and increase the randomness of the fixed length master frame. The technique fills unused portions of the fixed length master frame with random data to maximize the randomness of the fixed length master frame which can be used to produce a well behaved modulated signal for digital broadcasting, thereby increasing the efficiency of digital broadcasting system.

Abstract: An FM transmitter forms a Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) signal comprising a digital FM signal and an analog FM signal. The FM transmitter comprises an RF nonlinear amplifier coupled to a first antenna and an RF linear amplifier coupled to a second antenna. The RF non-linear amplifier and antenna transmit the analog FM signal. The RF linear amplifier and antenna transmit the digital FM signal. The FM transmitter controls the signal transmissions such that the transmitted analog FM signal and the transmitted digital FM signal are combined, or multiplexed, together in the channel itself (here, the atmosphere) to form the DAB signal.

Abstract: Interleaving methods and apparatus are disclosed for an in-band on-channel digital audio broadcasting system. The guard periods that separate any two adjacent symbols in a conventional OFDM system can provide a mechanism for OFDM frame synchronization. The guard period of successive OFDM frames is utilized to establish one or more unique positive or negative patterns and thereby provide a mechanism for interleaver synchronization. By proper positioning of the guard period patterns, one or more particular portions of each interleaver block are identified, such as the beginning and midpoint of each interleaver block. The present invention identifies the beginning of each interleaver block, for example, by positioning the fourth negative cyclic prefix with OFDM frame zero (0). The present invention can optionally identify the midpoint of each interleaver block, for example, by positioning the fourth negative cyclic prefix with OFDM frame 206.

Abstract: Interleaving methods and apparatus are disclosed for an in-band on-channel digital audio broadcasting system. The guard periods that separate any two adjacent symbols in a conventional OFDM system can provide a mechanism for OFDM frame synchronization. The guard period of successive OFDM frames is utilized to establish one or more unique positive or negative patterns and thereby provide a mechanism for interleaver synchronization. By proper positioning of the guard period patterns, one or more particular portions of each interleaver block are identified, such as the beginning and midpoint of each interleaver block. The present invention identifies the beginning of each interleaver block, for example, by positioning the fourth negative cyclic prefix with OFDM frame zero (0). The present invention can optionally identify the midpoint of each interleaver block, for example, by positioning the fourth negative cyclic prefix with OFDM frame 206.

Abstract: In accordance with the principles of the present invention, in addition to conventional use of frequency division multiplexed upper and lower side bands, the spectral area occupied by the analog host will be utilized by applying a one-dimensional modulation, e.g., pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) as opposed to the conventional use of a two-dimensional modulation, e.g., quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM). Furthermore, the analog and digital information within the analog host bandwidth may be combined in quadrature to keep the signals orthogonal. Thus, should one side band under the analog carrier be deteriorated or obliterated by adjacent channel interference, the other side band under the analog carrier can still provide useful data and hence better digital audio codec performance. By transmitting one or two digital data streams asymmetrically with respect to the center frequency, particular digital side bands can be rendered useless as environmental conditions warrant (e.g.

Abstract: A method and a receiver for reducing adjacent-channel interference to a digitally modulated receive signal evaluates error rates of the receive signal associated with different receive bandwidths of the receive signal. The receiver selects a preferential bandwidth among the different bandwidths based on a suitably low error rate associated with the preferential bandwidth. The selection of the different bandwidths is achieved by digital signal processing that weighs desired data bits representing a desired bandwidth differently than rejected data bits representing a rejected bandwidth.

Abstract: A receiver for receiving synchronized digital transmissions organized in frames, each frame having a frame start, has a clock for generating pulses at time intervals with respect to a time reference and a counter for generating a count of the time intervals with respect to the time reference. A/D converters sample the digital transmission using the pulses from the clock. A cyclic prefix correlator detects the frame start during a count corresponding to an A/D sample. This count is indicative of the time interval during which the frame start was detected with respect to the reference. A memory is provided for storing a plurality (typically 36) counts indicative of the time interval during which the frame start was detected. A pointer is generated from the counts stored in memory. The pointer is indicative of a projected time interval during which a future frame start is expected to arrive.

Abstract: An OFDM subcarrier method and apparatus effectively reassigns subcarriers with respect to a data stream from a plurality of Digital Audio Broadcast (DAB) services or programs to reduce selective effects (e.g., selective channel fading) of the transmission channel (e.g., an FM station) on some of the DAB services or programs but not on others. In one embodiment, a symbol reassignment encoder at the transmitter shuffles the data or symbols in the data stream from the DAB services to effectively reassign the subcarriers used by each of the DAB services. The reassignment spreads the selective effects of the transmission channel, e.g., channel fading, over a larger group of DAB services, to improve the robustness and quality of the overall transmission channel.

Abstract: An orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) technique which is time division multiplexed to reduce the overall effect on individual services from conditions such as selective fading. In accordance with the principles of the present invention, all available subcarriers in a channel are assigned to fewer than all of the requesting services, e.g., to just one particular service for a period of time. The period of time is preferably independent of the length of a conventional data frame. Thereafter, a second service is assigned access to the use of all available subcarriers for a period of time corresponding to its required bandwidth, and so on until all requesting services are allotted a portion of time for access to all available subcarriers. Any one service may utilize any number of the available subcarriers in a particular superframe containing one cycle of transmissions for all services.