A hardware implementation of an adaptive channel coding system

This paper details the implementation of an adaptive channel coding system on a DSP. Two DSP´s communicate directly over an AWGN (additive white Gaussian noise) channel. Multiple FEC (forward error correction) codes are then implemented directly onto the DSP´s to provide data integrity over the channel. Taking into account the current BER (bit error rate), the system chooses an appropriate FEC code to satisfy the user specified maximum BER. Three different coding algorithms were used, namely Hamming (7,4), Reed-Solomon (7,5,3) and 1/2 rate convolution coding. The BER vs. E_b/N_o transfer curves obtained experimentally allowed adaptive channel coding to be achieved.