System and method for reducing error propagation in a decision feedback equalizer of ATSC VSB receiver

摘要

For use in a receiver capable of decoding trellis encoded signals, there is disclosed an apparatus and method for reducing error propagation in a decision feedback equalizer. The apparatus of the invention comprises a trellis decoder and a decision feedback equalizer coupled to the path memory outputs of the trellis decoder. The decision feedback equalizer is capable of obtaining symbol values from the trellis decoder and using the symbol values as estimates in channel equalization. In one embodiment of the invention, a first equalizer and trellis decoder combination is used to estimate a symbol stream. Then a second equalizer and trellis decoder combination is used to further minimize error by operating on the output of the first equalizer and trellis decoder combination.