Patent ID: 6957376

Claim:
A turbo decoder assembly for decoding a data signal error-protection-coded with a turbo code based on parallel concatenated convolutional codes with interleaving at a transmitter end, transmitted via a disturbed transmission channel, and received in a receiver, comprising: a turbo decoder having a first computing device, a second computing device, and a bidirectional interface connected between said first and second computing devices for transferring data between said first and second computing devices, said turbo decoder being configured to iteratively decode a data signal received in the receiver in a computing loop, to be passed a plurality of times, and performing the following computing steps: (a) first symbol estimation of an input data signal, taking into consideration a first partly redundant data signal and a feedback data signal; (b) interleaving of the data signal calculated in the first symbol estimation; (c) second symbol estimation of the interleaved data signal, taking into consideration a second partly redundant data signal; and (d) deinterleaving the data signal calculated in the second symbol estimation, for determining the feedback data signal; said first computing device being configured to carry out steps (a) and (c), said first computing device including only one hardware-based symbol estimator being alternately used for carrying out computing steps (a) and (c); and said second computing device being configured to carry out steps (b) and (d), said second computing device being a software-based digital signal processor.