Multi-stage receiver

A multi-stage receiver for recovering a traffic signal from a plurality of received signals supplied by a receiver section, the received signals being associated with respective multipath paths of a sent signal encoded with the traffic signal and travelling through a transmission channel, comprising:

• for each received signal, a first processing stage connectable to the receiver section, for generating a first estimate of the traffic signal from the respective received signal;
• for each received signal, a second processing stage connected to the respective first processing stage and connectable to the receiver section, for generating a second estimate of the traffic signal from the respective first estimate of the traffic signal and from the respective received signal;
• for each received signal, a third processing stage connected to the respective second processing stage and connectable to the receiver section, for generating a set of values from the respective second estimate of the traffic signal and from the respective received signal, each said value being indicative of the likelihood of the traffic signal having a corresponding predetermined value;
• and
• a final processing stage connected to each third processing stage, for combining the set of values from each third processing stage and generating an improved estimate of the traffic signal therefrom.

A multi-stage receiver for recovering a traffic signal from at least one received signal supplied by a receiver section, the at least one received signal being associated with a respective multipath path of a sent signal encoded with the traffic signal and travelling through a transmission channel, comprising:

• for each received signal, a first processing stage connectable to the receiver section, for generating a set of values from the respective received signal, each said value being indicative of the likelihood of the traffic signal having a corresponding predetermined value;
• a common processing stage connected to each first processing stage, for combining the set of values from each first processing stage and generating a first estimate of the traffic signal therefrom;
• for each received signal, a second processing stage connected to the common processing stage and connectable to the receiver section, for generating a set of values from the first estimate of the traffic signal and from the respective received signal, each said value being indicative of the likelihood of the traffic signal having a corresponding predetermined value;
• and
• a final processing stage connected to each one second processing stage, for combining the set of values from each second processing stage and generating a second improved estimate of the traffic signal therefrom.

A method of recovering a traffic signal from at least one received signal supplied by a receiver section, the at least one received signal being associated with a respective multipath path of a sent signal encoded with the traffic signal and travelling through a transmission channel, comprising:

• for each received signal, generating a first estimate of the traffic signal from the respective received signal;
• for each received signal, generating a set of values from the respective first estimate of the traffic signal and from the respective received signal, each said value being indicative of the likelihood of the traffic signal having a corresponding predetermined value;
• and
• combining the set of values and generating a second improved estimate of the traffic signal therefrom.