Patent ID: 8537885

Claim:
An apparatus for applying decision feedback equalization to an input signal, comprising: a set of delays configured to receive the input signal, the set of delays comprising a fixed-tap group and a floating tap group, wherein delays of the fixed-tap group are coupled in series, wherein each delay holds a detected symbol of the input signal with a period based on the symbol period; multiplexing logic configured to couple predetermined outputs of the set of delays of the fixed tap group to selected ones of tile floating tap group and provide the output values of the selected ones of the floating tap group based on a relative best phase criteria to provide at least one of phase pruning and phase amalgamation; a combiner configured to i) adjust an output value of one or more of the fixed-tap group and the output values of the selected ones of the floating tap group by a corresponding tap-weight coefficient and ii) combine the tap-weight coefficient adjusted values into an output signal, wherein the output signal of the combiner is subtracted from the input signal, and wherein the multiplexing logic comprises a first multiplexor and a second multiplexor, thereby providing the phase pruning, wherein: the first multiplexor is configured to select different phases of the signal passing though the fixed-tap group, thereby selecting a subset of phases of the input signal for the floating-tap group; and the second multiplexor is configured to prune the subset of phases of the input signal for the floating-tap group to provide the selected ones of the floating lap group based on the relative best phase criteria.