This invention relates to an efficient, fully pipelined engine for Reed Solomon code decoding. It can be used from space missions, transmission channels, video broadcast systems and data storage systems.
BACKGROUND
Reed Solomon codes are used in various storage and communication applications because of their guaranteed burst error correction capability. Two main categories of decoders are algebraic soft decision decoders (SDD) and hard decision decoders (HDD). High speed data transmission techniques support high throughput but implementing a high speed and area efficient decoder architecture is a challenge. There is always a need for configurable RS decoder designs to choose the error correcting capability depending upon channel characteristics and performance.
TECHNOLOGY
The technology makes both SDD and HDD as rate configurable and can be used in various channel conditions. Compared to the existing hard decision pipelined decoders, this technique uses two staged pipelined decoders to operate at low latency possible and reduce size of delay buffer. The overall processing latencies of SDD and HDD are reduced by almost 58% and 80% compared to the existing designs respectively.