Patent ID: 8311075

Claim:
An improved method for decoding data in a frequency hopping communications system, comprising: receiving an incoming radio signal by a radio and demodulating the incoming radio signal to form a demodulated data system; monitoring transition points between data bits in a demodulated data stream to determine whether the transition points between the data bits fall within an expected transition region, where the data bits are transmitted to a receiver over different transmission frequencies; determining, for each of the different transmission frequencies, a reliability metric based on transition points of data bits transmitted over the respective transmission frequency, the reliability metric having one of a first value indicating the respective transmission frequency is reliable or a second value indicating the respective transmission frequency is unreliable; assigning a distinct reliability indicator to each data bit in the demodulated data stream, where the reliability indicator for a given data bit is the same as the reliability metric for the frequency over which the given data bit was transmitted to the receiver; and performing a decoding operation on the data bits of the data stream, the decoding operation using the reliability indicator assigned to respective data bits in the data stream.