Signal Calculator

Carrier Measurement

Measure the S/N ratio of the steady carrier using the longest possible coherent measurement time (narrowest bandwidth) to obtain an average S/N. Ideally, use a similar time of day and duration to the intended messages.

S/N ratio of carrier:  dB   In bandwidth:  Hz, or measurement period:  seconds

Code Selection

Choose a code, symbol period, message length and decoder list size. Choose the constraint length K according to the capacity of your decoding computer. If you are confident of the clock accuracy of the PCs at both ends, choose a rate 1/16 code, otherwise rate 1/8 is a safer bet.

Select code:
  Rate 1/4 K = 19
  Rate 1/8 K = 19
  Rate 1/16 K = 19
  Rate 1/8 K = 21
  Rate 1/16 K = 21
  Rate 1/16 K = 23
  Rate 1/8 K = 25
  Rate 1/16 K = 25

Symbol period:  seconds     CRC bits:     Number of characters: 


Calculation Results

Eb/N0: -14.08 dB
Signal bits: 1728
Duration: 3456 seconds, 00:57:36.00
Optimum list length: Very large (full phase search)
Optimum list length: Very large (uniform phase search only)
Percentage of channel capacity: 1776.5
Additional info:
Information rate: 178.1 bits per hour
Information bits: 171
Outer code overhead: 27 bits
Inner code block size: 198 bits
Overall code rate: 1/10.11
S/N in 1Hz: -27.13 dB
Signal bandwidth: 0.5 Hz
Es/N0: -24.12 dB
Decoder memory: 1.3 Gbyte
Symbol error rate: 0.46
Shannon capacity: 10.03 bits per hour