Patent ID: 6888888

Claim:
A system capable of receiving a signal that includes a plurality of channels, wherein the system allows at least two channels to be selected from the plurality of channels and combined into one sub-channel, such that certain signal processing may be performed on the one sub-channel, and wherein the certain signal processing of the one sub-channel requires fewer of certain components than would be required to process the at least two channels separately, the system comprising: at least two frequency sources, one for each of at least two channels to be selected from a plurality of channels included within an input signal; at least two mixers, each connected to one of the at least two frequency sources and the input signal, wherein one of the at least two mixers positions a first channel at a first intermediate frequency (IF), relative lower than a second intermediate frequency (IF) and the other positions a second channel at the second intermediate frequency (IF), relative higher than the first intermediate frequency (IF); low pass filter connected to one of the mixers, wherein the low pass filter receives the first IF and removes signals above the first channel; a high pass filter connected to one of the mixers, wherein the high pass filter receives the second IF and removes signals below the second channel; a summer connected to the low and high pass filters, wherein the summer receives and combines the first filtered IF and second filtered IF, such that the first channel and the second channel are adjacent to each other; and a band pass filter connected to the summer, wherein the band pass filter receives the combined first and second filtered IFs and removes signals below the first channel and above the second channel, such that a resulting multiple channel IF signal contains the adjacent first and second channels.