Chapter 3:

Pulse Code Modulation

 Pulse Code Modulation
 Quantizing
 Encoding
 Analogue to Digital Conversion
 Bandwidth of PCM Signals

Huseyin Bilgekul
Eeng360 Communication Systems I
Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Eastern Mediterranean University Eeng 360 1
 PULSE CODE MODULATION (PCM)
 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 advantages of PCM are:

• Relatively inexpensive digital circuitry may be used extensively.
• PCM signals derived from all types of analog sources may be merged with
data signals and transmitted over a common high-speed digital
communication system.
• In long-distance digital telephone systems requiring repeaters, a clean PCM
waveform can be regenerated at the output of each repeater, where the input
consists of a noisy PCM waveform.
• The noise performance of a digital system can be superior to that of an
analog system.
• The probability of error for the system output can be reduced even further
by the use of appropriate coding techniques.

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 Sampling, Quantizing, and Encoding
 The PCM signal is generated by carrying out three basic operations:
1. Sampling
2. Quantizing
3. Encoding
1. Sampling operation generates a flat-top PAM signal.
2. Quantizing operation approximates the analog values by using a
finite number of levels. This operation is considered in 3 steps
a) Uniform Quantizer
b) Quantization Error
c) Quantized PAM signal output
3. PCM signal is obtained from the quantized PAM signal by
encoding each quantized sample value into a digital word.

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 Analog to Digital Conversion
 The Analog-to-digital Converter (ADC)
performs three functions:
Analog – Sampling
Input • Makes the signal discrete in time.
Signal
• If the analog input has a bandwidth
Sample of W Hz, then the minimum sample
frequency such that the signal can be
reconstructed without distortion.
ADC – Quantization
Quantize • Makes the signal discrete in
111
110
101
amplitude.
100
011
• Round off to one of q discrete levels.
010

Encode
001
000
– Encode
• Maps the quantized values to digital
words that are  bits long.
 If the (Nyquist) Sampling Theorem is
Digital Output satisfied, then only quantization introduces
Signal distortion to the system.
111 111 001 010 011 111 011
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 Quantization
 The output of a sampler is still continuous in amplitude.
– Each sample can take on any value e.g. 3.752, 0.001, etc.
– The number of possible values is infinite.

 To transmit as a digital signal we must restrict the number of

possible values.

 Quantization is the process of “rounding off” a sample according to

some rule.
– E.g. suppose we must round to the nearest tenth, then:
 3.752 --> 3.8 0.001 --> 0

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Illustration of the Quantization Error

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 PCM TV transmission:

(a) 5-bit resolution;

(a) 8-bit resolution.

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 Uniform Quantization
Dynamic Range: • Most ADC’s use uniform
(-8, 8)
quantizers.
Output sample
XQ
7
• The quantization levels of a
uniform quantizer are
5

1
equally spaced apart.
-8 -6 -4 -2 -1 2 4 6 8
• Uniform quantizers are
Input sample X
-3
optimal when the input
-5 distribution is uniform.
-7 When all values within the
Quantization Characteristic Dynamic Range of the
Example: Uniform  =3 bit quantizer
quantizer are equally likely.
q=8 and XQ = {1,3,5,7}

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Quantization Example

Analogue signal

Sampling TIMING

Quantization levels.
Quantized to 5-levels

Quantization levels
Quantized 10-levels

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 PCM encoding example

Levels are encoded

using this table

Table: Quantization levels with belonging code words

M=8

Chart 2. Process of restoring a signal.

Chart 1. Quantization and digitalization of a signal. PCM encoded signal in binary form:
101 111 110 001 010 100 111 100 011 010 101
Signal is quantized in 11 time points & 8 quantization segments.
Total of 33 bits were used to encode a signal

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 Encoding
• The output of the quantizer is one of M possible signal levels.
– If we want to use a binary transmission system, then we need to map
each quantized sample into an n bit binary word.

M  2n , n  log 2 ( M )
• Encoding is the process of representing each quantized sample
by an  bit code word.
– The mapping is one-to-one so there is no distortion introduced by
encoding.
– Some mappings are better than others.
• A Gray code gives the best end-to-end performance.
• The weakness of Gray codes is poor performance when the sign bit
(MSB) is received in error.

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 Gray Codes
• With gray codes adjacent samples differ only in one bit position.
• Example (3 bit quantization):
XQ Natural coding Gray Coding
+7 111 110
+5 110 111
+3 101 101
+1 100 100
-1 011 000
-3 010 001
-5 001 011
-7 000 010
• With this gray code, a single bit error will result in an amplitude
error of only 2.
– Unless the MSB is in error.

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 Waveforms in a PCM system for M=8
M=8

(a) Quantizer Input output characteristics

(b) Analog Signal, PAM Signal, Quantized PAM Signal

M  2n n  log 2 ( M )
M is the number of Quantization levels
(c) Error Signal n is the number of bits per sample

(d) PCM Signal Eeng 360 13

PCM Transmission System

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 Practical PCM Circuits
• Three popular techniques are used to implement the
analog-to-digital converter (ADC) encoding
operation:
1. The counting or ramp, ( Maxim ICL7126 ADC)
2. Serial or successive approximation, (AD 570)
3. Parallel or flash encoders. ( CA3318)
• The objective of these circuits is to generate the
PCM word.
• Parallel digital output obtained (from one of the
above techniques) needs to be serialized before
sending over a 2-wire channel
• This is accomplished by parallel-to-serial
converters [Serial Input-Output (SIO) chip]
• UART,USRT and USART are examples for SIO’s

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 Bandwidth of PCM Signals
• The spectrum of the PCM signal is not directly related to the spectrum of the
input signal.
• The bandwidth of (serial) binary PCM waveforms depends on the bit rate R and
the waveform pulse shape used to represent the data.
• The Bit Rate R is
R=nfs

Where n is the number of bits in the PCM word (M=2n) and fs is the sampling rate.
• For no aliasing case (fs≥ 2B), the MINIMUM Bandwidth of PCM Bpcm(Min) is:

Bpcm(Min) = R/2 = nfs//2

The Minimum Bandwidth of nfs//2 is obtained only when sin(x)/x pulse is used to
generate the PCM waveform.

• For PCM waveform generated by rectangular pulses, the First-null Bandwidth is:

Bpcm = R = nfs
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