Digital Pulse Modulation

Merits of Digital Communication:

1. Digital signals are very easy to receive and the receiver has to just detect whether the
pulse is low or high.
2. The signals usually lose power as they travel, which is called as attenuation. When AM
and FM signals are amplified, the noise also get amplified. But the digital signals can
be cleaned up to restore the quality and amplified by the regenerators.
3. In digital signals, the original signal can be reproduced accurately.
4. The noise may change the shape of the pulses but not the pattern of the pulses.
5. AM and FM signals can be received by any one by a suitable receiver. But digital
signals can be coded so that only the person, who is intended for, can receive them.
6. AM and FM transmitters are real time systems. i.e. they can be received only at the
time of transmission. But digital signals can be stored at the receiving end.
7. The digital signals can be stored.

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Pulse Digital Modulation

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Block Diagram of PCM

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PCM Transmission system

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 Definition: Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) is essentially Analog-to-Digital
conversion of a special type where the information contained in the instantaneous
samples of an analog signal is represented by Digital words in a serial bit stream.

The essential processes of PCM are Sampling, Quantizing and Encoding. The
Quantizing & Encoding operations are usually performed in the same circuit called
as Analog-To-Digital (A/D) converter.

Sampling is the process in which a continuous-time signal is sampled by

measuring its amplitude at discrete instants.
The process of generating pulses of zero width and of amplitude equal to the
instantaneous amplitude of the analog signal. The no. of pulses per second is
called sampling rate.
Representing the sampled values of the amplitude by a finite set of levels is called
Quantizing.
The process of dividing the maximum value of the analog signal into a fixed no. of
levels in order to convert the PAM into a Binary Code. The levels obtained are
called quantization levels.
Designating each quantized level by a code is called encoding.

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 Pulse-Code Modulation (PCM) is the most commonly used digital
modulation scheme
In PCM, the available range of signal voltages is divided into levels and
each is assigned a binary number
Each sample is represented by a binary number and transmitted serially
The number of levels available depends upon the number of bits used
to express the sample value
The number of levels is given by: L=2R
Before we sample, we have to filter the signal to limit the maximum
frequency of the signal .Filtering should ensure that we do not distort
the signal.
i.e. remove high frequency components that affect the signal shape.

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Cont

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 Example of PCM process:

V Sampling,
o Quantization and
l Coding
t
a
g
e Time
7 111
L 6 110 B
e
5 101
i C
4 100 o
v 3 011 n
e 2 010 a d
l 1 001
r e
s 0 000
y s
Time
V
o 010101110 1 1 1 110101 010
l
t
a
g
e 8
Time
 Transmission Band-width in a PCM system:
The number of levels is given by: L=2R , so the no. of bits per sample is R.
Transmission Bandwidth is BPCM= R fm

Quantization
By quantizing the PAM pulse, original signal is only approximated.
The process of converting analog signals to PCM is called quantizing.
Since the original signal can have an infinite number of signal levels,
the quantizing process will produce errors called quantizing errors or
quantizing noise.

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 Uniform Quantizer

Quantizer type: The quantizer characteristic can be of mid-tread or midrise quantizer.

Both are symmetry about the origin. These two types are shown in Figure

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PCM Encoding Example

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