Patent ID: 7412235

Claim:
An automatic meter reading (AMR) system comprising: at least one meter reading device adapted to transmit radio frequency (RF) communications having at least one predetermined target data rate for use by at least one of a plurality of endpoint devices; and at least one endpoint device of the plurality of endpoint devices, the at least one endpoint device having a meter interface module in communication with a meter device and adapted to receive the RF communications having the at least one predetermined target data rate and to reject non-target data rate RF signals that do not have any of the at least one target data rate and are not for use by the at least one endpoint device; the meter interface module including a digital squelch circuit arrangement adapted to distinguish from among the at least one predetermined target data rate and a non-predetermined non-target data rate in on-air RF communication signals, wherein the digital squelch circuit arrangement is adapted to determine occurrences of good edges indicative of the at least one predetermined target data rate and occurrences of bad edges indicative of the non-predetermined non-target data rate in the on-air RF communication signals, the squelch circuit arrangement further adapted to determine whether the on-air communication signals include a data rate that corresponds to the at least one predetermined target data rate by at least monitoring an edge count of the good edges and an edge count of the bad edges; wherein the meter interface module is adapted to respond to a detection of the data rate of an inbound-RF communication signal corresponding to the at least one predetermined target data rate by conducting reception activity to receive that RF communication signal having the at least one target data rate and to respond to a detection of the data rate of an on-air RF communication signal not matching the target data rate by immediately discontinuing reception of that on-air RF communication signal having the non-target data rate.