Sub-channel acquisition in a digital television receiver designed to receive mobile/handheld signals

Transmitter apparatus for transmitting mobile/handheld (M/H) service data for being reproduced at M/H receivers in addition to main service data for being reproduced at digital television receivers, the transmitter apparatus comprising:

• an M/H pre-processor for pre-processing the M/H service data by randomizing, Reed-Solomon (R-S) coding, cyclic redundancy check (CRC) coding, convolutional coding,symbol interleaving, byte de-interleaving and packetizing the M/H service data to generate packets of pre-processed M/H service data;
• a packet multiplexer for generating a time-division-multiplex (TDM) signal that multiplexes packets of main service data and the packets of pre-processed M/H service data, the packet multiplexer arranging the packets of pre-processed M/H service data within M/H Groups, each of which M/H Groups is transmitted within a respective one of 16 Slots within one of 5 sub-frames of one of a succession of M/H Frames each of a duration equal to that of 20 8-VSB data frames;
• and
• an M/H post-processor for processing the TDM signal to generate eight-level symbols for 8VSB transmission,
• wherein the M/H pre-processor comprises a signaling encoder for encoding Transmission Parameter Channel (TPC) data and Fast Information Channel (FIC) data by successively R-S coding, block interleaving, randomizing and parallel concatenated convolutional coding (PCCC) the TPC data and FIC data, a respective encoded TPC data signal and a respective encoded segment of an FIC data Chunk being supplied from the signaling encoder for transmission within each of said M/H Groups, each of the TPC signals supplied in an initial two sub-frames of each one of said succession of M/H Frames including at a first position of that TPC signal a current_TNoG minus—1 plural-bit indication, each of the TPC signals supplied in a final three sub-frames of each one of said succession of M/H Frames including at a second position of that TPC signal a current_TNoG_minus—1 plural-bit indication.

A receiver for 8-VSB signals transmitted in modulation of respective radio-frequency (RF) carrier waves within respective allocated frequency channels, some of the respective RF carrier waves modulated by successive M/H Groups of eight-level digital symbols occupying at least some of 16 Slots available in each of five sub-Frames in each of successive M/H Frames, digital symbols in each of the M/H Groups at selected times encoding randomized bits of a respective Reed-Solomon (RS)-coded Transmission Parameter Channel (TPC) signal followed by a respective segment of a block-interleaved RS-coded Fast Information Channel (FIC) signal, the respective RS-coded TPC signal in each of the M/H Groups descriptive of concatenated convolutional coded (CCC) data contained in digital symbols of the M/H Group other than those encoding the respective RS-coded TPC signal followed by the respective segment of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal, the CCC data generated by outer convolutional coding followed by symbol interleaving and 12-phase two-thirds-rate trellis coding, in each of the M/H Groups the respective RS-coded TPC signal including a sequence of current_TNoG_minus—1 bits at a prescribed location for the each of the five sub-Frames of the each of the successive M/H Frames that includes the M/H Group, each the sequence of current_TNoG_minus—1 bits specifying a total number of the M/H Groups accompanying within a same sub-Frame one of the M/H Groups in which the RS-coded TPC signal containing the sequence of current_TNoG_minus—1 bits is encoded, the segments of RS-coded FIC signal encoded within the one of the M/H Groups within each the sub-Frame being matrix block interleaved for all of the sub-Frame, the receiver for 8-VSB signals comprising:

• conversion apparatus for receiving a selected one of the 8-VSB signals as transmitted in 8-VSB modulation of a radio-frequency (RF) carrier wave within a respective frequency channel and converting it to digital samples of a baseband signal;
• a cascade connection of decoders connected for receiving digital samples of the baseband signal and for reproducing the respective RS-coded TPC signal followed by the respective segment of block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal encoded after bit-randomization within each of the M/H Groups;
• a bit de-randomizer connected for supplying a de-randomized response to the bits of the respective Reed-Solomon-coded TPC signals followed by respective segments of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal reproduced by the cascade connection of decoders;
• a TPC code gate connected for selecting the RS-coded TPC signals from the de-randomized response of the bit de-randomizer;
• a first RS decoder connected for decoding the RS-coded TPC signals selected by the TPC code gate and supplying decoded TPC signals;
• a TNoG extractor connected for responding to current_TNoG_minus—1 information from each and every one of the decoded TPC signals, the TNoG extractor further connected for supplying TNoG information responsive at least in part to the current_TNoG_minus—1 information;
• a block de-interleaver for the segments of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal, which block de-interleaver includes a memory for temporarily storing the segments of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal, and further, includes a read/write control unit connected for controlling writing and reading of the memory in accordance with TNoG information supplied thereto by the TNoG extractor;
• an FIC code gate connected for selecting the segments of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal from the de-randomized response of the bit de-randomizer and supplying them to the block de-interleaver as an input signal thereto, for being written into the memory and temporarily stored in the memory;
• and
• a second RS decoder connected for decoding the RS-coded FIC signals as read in de-interleaved form from the memory and supplying decoded chunks of an FIC signal.

A receiver for 8-VSB signals transmitted in modulation of respective radio-frequency (RF) carrier waves within respective allocated frequency channels, some of the respective RF carrier waves modulated by successive M/H Groups of eight-level digital symbols occupying at least some of 16 Slots available in each of five sub-Frames in each of successive M/H Frames, digital symbols in each of the M/H Groups at selected times encoding randomized bits of a respective Reed-Solomon (RS)-coded Transmission Parameter Channel (TPC) signal followed by a respective segment of a block-interleaved RS-coded Fast Information Channel (FIC) signal, the respective RS-coded TPC signal in each of the M/H Groups descriptive of concatenated convolutional coded (CCC) data contained in digital symbols of the M/H Group other than those encoding the respective RS-coded TPC signal followed by the respective segment of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal, the CCC data generated by outer convolutional coding followed by symbol interleaving and 12-phase two-thirds-rate trellis coding, in each of the M/H Groups the respective RS-coded TPC signal including a sequence of current_TNoG_minus—1 bits at a prescribed location for the each of the five sub-Frames of the each of the successive M/H Frames that includes the M/H Group, each the sequence of current_TNoG_minus—1 bits specifying a total number of the M/H Groups accompanying within a same sub-Frame one of the M/H Groups in which the RS-coded TPC signal containing the sequence of current_TNoG_minus—1 bits is encoded, the segments of RS-coded FIC signal encoded within the one of the M/H Groups within each the sub-Frame being matrix block interleaved for all of the sub-Frame, the receiver for 8-VSB signals comprising:

• conversion apparatus for receiving a selected one of the 8-VSB signals as transmitted in 8-VSB modulation of a radio-frequency (RF) carrier wave within a respective frequency channel and converting it to digital samples of a baseband signal;
• a cascade connection of decoders connected for receiving digital samples of the baseband signal and for reproducing the respective RS-coded TPC signal followed by the respective segment of block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal encoded after bit-randomization within each of the M/H Groups;
• a bit de-randomizer connected for supplying a de-randomized response to the bits of the respective Reed-Solomon-coded TPC signals followed by respective segments of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal reproduced by the cascade connection of decoders;
• a TPC code gate connected for selecting the RS-coded TPC signals from the de-randomized response of the bit de-randomizer;
• a first RS decoder connected for decoding the RS-coded TPC signals selected by the TPC code gate and supplying decoded TPC signals;
• an extractor of an M/H sub-Frame number connected for responding to ones of the decoded TPC signals and for supplying the M/H sub-Frame number for each of the five sub-Frames in each of the successive M/H Frames;
• a block de-interleaver for the segments of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal;
• an FIC code gate connected for selecting the segments of the block-interleaved RS-coded FIC signal from the de-randomized response of the bit de-randomizer and supplying them to the block de-interleaver as an input signal thereto, for being written into a memory of the block de-interleaver and temporarily stored in the memory;
• a second RS decoder connected for decoding the RS-coded FIC signals as read in de-interleaved form from the memory and supplying decoded chunks of an FIC signal;
• and
• an FIC-Chunk processing unit connected for receiving as a first input signal thereof the decoded chunks of the FIC signal supplied as the output signal of the second RS decoder, the FIC-Chunk processing unit connected for receiving as a second input signal thereof the M/H sub-Frame number currently supplied from the extractor of M/H sub-Frame number, and the FIC-Chunk processing unit connected for supplying a processed FIC signal resulting from parsing and code-combining the decoded chunks of the FIC signal therewithin.

A receiver for 8-VSB signals transmitted in modulation of respective radio-frequency (RF) carrier waves within respective allocated frequency channels, at least one of the respective RF carrier waves at selected times being modulated by concatenated convolutional code (CCC) descriptive of data-randomized internet protocol (IP) data packets that include amongst them SMT-MH packets containing Service Map Table (SMT) information, sets of the data-randomized IP packets descriptive of different services controlling the modulation of a same RF carrier wave during different time slots that define sub-channels of an allocated channel of the same radio-frequency carrier wave, some of the SMT-MH packets containing updated SMT information and others of the SMT-MH packets containing repeated SMT information, a respective header of each of the IP data packets containing a respective two-byte checksum for cyclic-redundancy-check (CRC) coding of that particular one of the IP data packets, the receiver comprising:

• conversion apparatus for receiving a selected one of the 8-VSB signals as transmitted in 8-VSB modulation of the RF carrier wave within the respective frequency channel and converting it to digital samples of a baseband signal;
• decoders arranged for responding to the digital samples of the baseband signal that comprise CCC descriptive of the IP data packets to reproduce segments of the data-randomized IP data packets, some of which are data-randomized SMT-MH packets;
• a data de-randomizer for reproducing in a response therefrom segments of the IP data packets including the SMT-MH packets responsive to the segments of the data-randomized IP data packets including the data-randomized SMT-MH packets reproduced by the CCC decoder;
• an IP-packet parser that separates the IP data packets including the SMT-MH packets from the de-randomized input signal;
• a cyclic-redundancy-check (CRC) decoder connected for determining whether or not each of the IP data packets including the SMT-MH packets separated by the IP-packet parsing circuitry is likely to be in error from the CRC coding thereof, the CRC decoder connected for supplying an indication of each determination that it makes;
• a selector for sorting the SMT-MH packets from others of the IP packets;
• an SMT-MH processor for receiving the SMT-MH packets after being sorted from the others of the IP packets and generating Service Map Tables (SMTs) for use in controlling the receiver;
• an SMT memory for temporarily storing a current one of the SMTs generated by the SMT-MH processor;
• a cache memory for temporarily storing at least the others of the IP packets for possible subsequent use not found by the CRC decoder likely to be in error;
• and
• a later stage unit connected for receiving read-outs from the cache memory comprising selected ones of the others of the IP packets for possible subsequent use

An mobile/handheld (M/H) receiver comprising:

• an input unit for receiving an input signal transmitted in 8-VSB modulation of a radio-frequency carrier wave within a selected frequency channel, the input signal comprising data-randomized M/H data from Internet protocol (IP) data packets, and the IP data packets comprising Service Map Table for M/H data (SMT-MH) packets;
• a decoding unit for decoding portions of the input signal which are encoded with concatenated convolutional coding (CCC) to generate a decoded input signal reproducing the data-randomized M/H data;
• a data de-randomizer for de-randomizing the data-randomized M/H data reproduced in the decoded input signal;
• an IP-packet parser for separating the IP data packets including the SMT-MH packets from the de-randomized input signal;
• a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) decoder for determining whether each of the IP data packets including the SMT-MH packets separated by the IP-packet parser is in error from CRC coding of the input signal;
• an SMT-MH processor for responding to the SMT-MH packets to generate at least one Service Map Table for use in controlling operations of the M/H receiver;
• an SMT memory for temporarily storing each of the at least one Service Map Table generated by the SMT-MH processor;
• a cache memory for temporarily storing supposedly non-erroneous IP data packets, that have not been determined by the CRC decoder to be in error, among the IP data packets remaining after the SMT-MH packets are sorted;
• and
• a later stage unit for utilizing the supposedly non-erroneous IP data packets read from the cache memory.