Chapter 8. EDMAC CHANNEL

Theory Of Operation

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M&C Connection

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Setup Summary

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8.1THEORY OF OPERATION

As explained earlier, EDMAC is an acronym for Embedded Distant-end Monitor And Control. This is a feature which permits the user to access the M&C features of modems which are at the distant-end of a satellite link.

This is accomplished by adding extra information to the user’s data, but in a manner which is completely transparent to the user.

8.1.1ON THE TRANSMIT SIDE:

The data is split into frames - each frame containing 1008 bits (except Rate 21/44 BPSK Turbo, where the frame length is 2928 bits, and Rate 5/16 BPSK Turbo where the frame length is 3072 bits). 48 bits in each frame are overhead, and the rest of these bits are the user’s data. This increases the rate of transmission by 5% (approximately 1.6% for the Turbo BPSK cases). For example, if the user’s data rate is 64 kbps, the actual transmission rate will now be at 67.2 kbps.

At the start of each frame a 12 bit synchronization word is added. This allows the demodulator to find and lock to the start of frame. At regular intervals throughout the frame, additional data bytes and flag bits are added (a further 36 bits in total). It is these additional bytes which convey the M&C data.

When framing is used, the normal V.35 scrambler is no longer used. This V.35 approach is called ‘self synchronizing’, because in the receiver, no external information is required in order for the de-scrambling process to recover the original data. The disadvantage of this method is that it multiplies errors. On average, if one bit error is present at the input of the descrambler, 3 output errors are generated.

There is an alternative when the data is in a framed format. In this case, a different class of scrambler may be used - one which uses the start of frame information to start the scrambling process at an exact known state. In the receiver, having synchronized to the frame, the de-scrambler can begin its processing at exactly the right time. This method does not multiply errors, and therefore has a clear advantage over V.35 scrambling.

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