UNIT- 3 DIGITAL TRANSMISSION

Digital communication system is a system through which we can share different

types of data worldwide. Digital communication sends the data via different
frequency signals. It has a very important role in our modern society.

We can tweet anything in seconds and that is worldwide available to read. the
beautiful or funny posts you have uploaded on social media and the comments of
your friends, that late chats and video calls with your friends and family, this blog that
you are reading, that all are possible because of digitalization in communication
system.We are going to see what the science behind this very speedy communication
system is. Firstly, we are going to see the technology and main devices required in it.

BLOCK DIAGRAM OF DIGITAL COMMUNICATION SYSTEM

SENDER:

Transducer: The diagram starts with the sender, which transmits the data and
receiver receives the information at the end. so, the data can be audio, video, image,
text or any other type. Now, this information may be analog or may be digital. If the
information signal is in an electric signal then it is okay. But, if the information is not in
the electrical signal form, (for example audio, video, image or text) then we need to
convert them into an electric signal. However, the transducer converts the
non-electric signal into an electric signal. So, after the first block the information is
in the form of an electrical signal.

Source Encoding: The main task of source encoding is to reduce redundancy so we

can use bandwidth effectively. At this stage the digital data gets compromised and
there are multiple ways to compress the digital data like Huffman coding and
Shannon Fano coding. For analog redundancy we go for adaptive delta
modulation and Pulse-code modulation. So, after this block the signal will be
digital.

Channel Encoding: It is used to provide noise immunity by adding redundancy in it.

There are many techniques available for it like Block code, Cyclic code,
Convolutional code and many more techniques are available. After this block the
signal will still be a digital signal.

Digital Modulator and Antenna: To transmit information at longer distances we

need to convert the low frequency digital signal into high frequency analog signal.
Digital Modulator multiplies the digital signal we converted in last stage with high
frequency carrier signal and convert it in high frequency analog signal so we can
easily send it by antenna.There are various techniques available for converting signal
like Amplitude-shift keying (ASK), frequency-shift keying (FSK), phase-shift
keying (PSK) and Quadrature Phase Shift Keying (QPSK). After this block the
signal is converted into a high frequency modulated signal which the antenna will get
and transmit further.

Antennas: Antennas are widely used in the field of digital communication. They
receive an electromagnetic wave and convert it into an electric signal or receive an
electric signal and convert it into an electromagnetic wave.

RECEIVER:

Digital Demodulator and Antenna: By its name that it will demodulate the signal
that is received by the receiver antenna. And again convert the high frequency analog
signal to digital signal.

Channel Decoding: [We transmitted a signal, It converted into an electrical

signal(digital or analog). After it we source encoded that signal and convert it into a
digital signal.Suppose that the source code we get from that is [010101]. After doing
channel encoding we get signal channel code 011010101(suppose).Now the digital
modulator will transmit the signal but before reaching to the receiver the signal may
get disturbed because of noise. So the information may not remain the same, it will
change. The wrong information will get at the other end. And this thing is dangerous.
This is why channel decoding is important at the receiver side.]

At channel decoding, it checks if the received signal is the same as transmitted.For

example if it’s 011010100 (transmitted was 011010101). There is one bit error. So, the
channel decoder will correct the signal. And if the received signal is not changed so
the channel decoder will do nothing with it. It will only remove the redundancy so as
per our example the code will be [010101] (the front 011 will removed which was
added by channel decoder at the transmitter side)

Source Decoding: Source decoder will convert the digital signal into the analog
signal. And that will again be converted into an information signal by the speaker,
television or any other device.
Advantages and Disadvantages of the digital communication system

Advantages:

● It is simpler and cheaper because integrated circuits became smaller, speedy

and chep.
● More privacy and security through the use of encryption because we can
rearrange digital data.
● Data correction, error detection and error correction is possible
● Flexible hardware implementation because, if hardware will change we can
change the programming language.
● Easier and sufficient multiplexing by TDMA(Time-division multiple access) &
CDMA(Code-Division Multiple Access)

Disadvantages:

● High power consumption due to multiple stages and complex circuits as we

show in the Digital Communication Block Diagram.
● Bandwidth per channel is very high.
● Synchronization is compulsory, if we don’t synchronize the data so there will be
many errors in information.

PARALLEL AND SERIAL PORTS

Serial Ports
Serial Ports provide an interface to connect serial lines to prepare a serial
communication. Serial ports are typically used in modem, mouse, security cameras
etc. A Serial port uses DB-9 connector, a 9 pin D-Shaped Connector which connects
to the transmission line. A serial port provides a serial communication using one line
and thus has no dependency on other wire's speed and its length can be extended as
per the need.
Parallel Ports
Parallel ports provide an interface to connect multiple lines to prepare a parallel
communication to send large data at a time. Parallel ports are used in connecting
printers, hard-drives, CD-drives etc. All lines speed should be the same to avoid error
and cross-talk issues. To avoid such issues, the wires are kept small in length. A
parallel port uses a D-25 connector, a 25 pin D-Shaped connector which connects to
the transmission wires.

Following are the important differences between Serial Ports and Parallel Ports.

Sr.No Key Serial Ports Parallel Ports

.

Purpose Serial Port is used for Parallel Port is used for

1
serial data transmission. parallel data transmission.

Transmission Transmission speed of a Transmission speed of a

Speed serial port is slow as parallel port is quite high as
2
compared to a parallel compared to a serial port.
port.

Redundancy Bottom-Up model is better Top-down model has a high

suited as it ensures ratio of redundancy as the size
3
minimum data redundancy of the project increases.
and focus is on re-usability.
 No. Of Wires Wire connections to the No. of wires that are
serial port are quite less as connected to parallel ports are
4
compared to parallel ports. quite high as compared to
serial ports.

Capability A serial port is able to A parallel port is able to

5 transmit a single stream of transmit multiple data streams
data at a time. at a time.

Data Sending A serial port sends data bit A parallel port sends data by
6 Mechanism by bit after sending a bit at sending multiple bits in parallel
a time. fashion.

Port Type A serial port uses Male A parallel port uses Female
7
ports. ports.

Applications Modems,security cameras, Printers, Hard Drives, CD

8 device controllers use drives use parallel ports.
serial ports.

ANALOG TO DIGITAL CONVERSION

The tendency today is to change an analog signal to digital data. The following
techniques can be used for Analog to Digital Conversion:

● Pulse Code Modulation

● Delta Modulation
 I. PULSE CODE MODULATION (PCM):

The most common technique to change an analog signal to digital data (digitization)
is called pulse code modulation (PCM). A PCM encoder has the following three
processes:

1. Sampling (The analog signal is sampled)

2. Quantization (The sampled signal is quantised)
3. Encoding (The quantised values are encoded as streams of bits)

Sampling – The first step in PCM is sampling. Sampling is a process of measuring

the amplitude of a continuous-time signal at discrete instants, converting the
continuous signal into a discrete signal. There are three sampling methods:

(i) Ideal Sampling: In ideal Sampling also known as Instantaneous sampling pulses
from the analog signal are sampled. This is an ideal sampling method and cannot be
easily implemented.

(ii) Natural Sampling: Natural Sampling is a practical method of sampling in which

pulses have finite width equal to T.The result is a sequence of samples that retain
the shape of the analog signal.
(iii) Flat top sampling: In comparison to natural sampling flat top sampling can be
easily obtained. In this sampling technique, the top of the samples remains constant
by using a circuit. This is the most common sampling method used.

The sampling process is sometimes referred to as Pulse Amplitude Modulation

(PAM).
Sampling rate : According to the Nyquist theorem, the sampling rate must be at least
2 times the highest frequency contained in the signal. It is also known as the
minimum sampling rate

Quantization – The result of sampling is a series of pulses with amplitude values

between the maximum and minimum amplitudes of the signal. The set of amplitudes
can be infinite with non-integral values between two limits.
The following are the steps in Quantization:

● We assume that the signal has amplitudes between Vmax and Vmin
● We divide the range into L zones each of height d where, d= (Vmax- Vmin)/ L.
Eg: assume that we have a sampled signal and the sample amplitudes are
between -20V and +20V. We decide to have eight levels(L=8).
therefore , d= 20 -(-20) /8 =5V
 ● We assign quantized values of 0 to (L-1) to the midpoint of each zone.
● The value at the top of each sample in the graph shows the actual amplitude.
● The first row is the normalized pulse amplitude modulation(PAM) value for
each sample.The normalized value is calculated using the formula (actual
amplitude/d)
● After this we calculate the quantized value which the process selects from the
middle of each zone.
● The Quantized error is given by the difference between quantised value and
normalised PAM value.
● The Quantization code for each sample based on quantization levels at the left
of the graph.

Quantization level: The choice of L, the number of levels, depends on the range of
the amplitude of the signal and how accurately we need to recover the signal. [If the
amplitude of a signal fluctuates between two values only, we need two levels. In audio
digitizing, L is chosen to 256. In the video it is 1000.] Choosing lower values of L
increases the quantization error.

Quantization Error: Quantization is an approximation process. The input values to the

quantizer are real values; the output values are the approximate values. The output
values are chosen to be the middle value in the zone. If the input value is also at the
middle of the zone, there is no quantization error, otherwise there is an error. [ In the
previous example the normalised PAM value of the third sample is 3.24, but the
normalised quantized value is 3.50. This means that there is an error of +0.26].The
value of the error for any sample is less than d/2.

Companding - Companding is a technique of achieving non-uniform quantization in

PCM. It is a word formed by the combination of words compression and expanding.
Companding is done in order to improve SNR of weak signals.
In many applications, the distribution of the instantaneous amplitude in analog signals
is not uniform. Nonuniform quantization can be achieved by using a process called
companding.
The signal companded at the sender before conversion and it is expanded at the
receiver after conversion.

Encoding – The digitization of the analog signal is done by the encoder. After each
sample is quantized and the number of bits per sample is decided, each sample can
be changed to an n bit code. Encoding also minimizes the bandwidth used.
The number of bits for each sample is determined from the number of quantization
levels. If the number of quantization levels is L , the number of bits is nb = log2 L. The
bit rate can be found from the formula
Bit rate = sampling rate x number of bits per sample
= fs x nb

In our example, L is 8 and n b is therefore 3.

II. DELTA MODULATION (DM):

PCM is a very complex technique. Other techniques have been developed to reduce
the complexity of PCM. The simplest is delta modulation. Delta Modulation finds the
change from the previous value.

Modulator – The modulator is used at the sender site to create a stream of bits from
an analog signal. The process records a small positive change called delta(σ). If the
delta is positive, the process records a 1; if it is negative, the process records a 0.
The modulator builds a second signal that resembles a staircase. The input signal is
then compared with this gradually made staircase signal.
We have the following rules for output:

● At each sampling interval, compare the value of the analog signal with the last
value of the staircase signal.
● If the input analog signal is higher than the last value of the staircase signal,
increase delta by 1, and the bit in the digital data is 1.
● If the input analog signal is lower than the last value of the staircase signal,
decrease delta by 1, and the bit in the digital data is 0.

Demodulator- The demodulator takes the digital data and using the staircase maker
and the delay unit , creates the analog signal.

ADAPTIVE DELTA MODULATION:

The performance of a delta modulator can be improved significantly by making the
step size of the modulator assume a time-varying form. A larger step-size is needed
where the message has a steep slope of modulating signal and a smaller step-size is
needed where the message has a small slope. The size is adapted according to the
level of the input signal. This method is known as adaptive delta modulation (ADM).
TRANSMISSION MODES

Data is transferred in the form of bits between two or more digital devices. There are two
methods used to transmit data between digital devices: Parallel transmission and Serial
transmission.

Parallel Transmission:
In Parallel Transmission, many bits flow together simultaneously from one computer to
another computer. When data is sent using parallel transmission, multiple data bits are
transmitted over multiple channels at the same time. Parallel Transmission is faster than
serial transmission to transmit the bits.

The main advantages of parallel transmission are it is easier to program and data sent fast.
Disadvantage is cost: it requires n communication lines just to transmit the data stream and
it is usually limited to short distances.
Parallel Transmission is used when a large amount of data is sent, the data being sent is
time sensitive and the data needs to be sent quickly.

Serial Transmission:
In Serial Transmission, one bit flows another, so we need only one communication channel.
When data is sent or received using serial data transmission, the data bits are organised in
a specific order,since they can only be sent one after another. The order of the data bit is
important. It is a reliable data transmission method because a data bit is only sent if the
previous data bit has already been received. In this transmission, one bit flows at one clock
pulse.

Serial transmission is normally used for long distance data transfer. It is used in cases
where the amount of data being sent is relatively small.
The advantage of serial over parallel transmission is that with only one communication
channel, it reduces the cost of transmission.

Serial transmission occurs in three ways: Asynchronous, Synchronous and Isochronous.

Asynchronous Serial Transmission :-

Data bits can be sent at any point time, because timing of a signal is unimportant. Instead,
information is received and translated by agreed upon patterns. Patterns are based on
grouping the bit stream into bytes. Each group is usually 8 bits. Without synchronisation,the
receiver cannot use timing to predict when the next group will arrive. To alert the receiver,we
send one start bit(0) at the beginning and one or more Stop bits(1s) at the end of each
byte.The time between sending and receiving data is not constant,the transmission of each
byte may then be followed by a gap of varying duration.

The advantage of using an asynchronous method is that no synchronisation is required

between the transmitter and receiver devices. It is cheap and cost effective.
A disadvantage is that data transmission can be slower.

Synchronous Serial Transmission:-

In synchronous transmission, the bit stream is combined into longer frames,which may
contain multiple bytes. We send bits one after another without start or stop bits or gaps. It is
the responsibility of the receiver to group the bits. Ie, Data bits are transmitted as a
continuous stream in the time master clock. The data transmitter and receiver both operate
using a synchronized clock frequency.

The above figure gives the schematic illustration of synchronous transmission. We have
drawn in the division between bytes. In reality, that division does not exist;the sender puts its
data into the line as one long string.
Without gaps and start and stop bits,there is no built-in mechanism to help the receiving
device adjust its bits. Timing becomes very important, therefore, because the accuracy of
the received information is completely dependent on the ability of the receiving device to
keep an accurate count of the bits as they come in.
The advantages of synchronous transmission is speed.