EEE482F: Problem Set 1

1. A digital source emits −1.0 and 0.0V levels with a probability of 0.2 each,
and +3.0 and +4.0V levels with a probability of 0.3 each. Evaluate the
average information of the source.
2. Consider a source that produces 6 messages with probabilities 12 , 14 , 81 , 1
16 ,
1 1
32 , and 32 . Determine the average information content of a message.
3. A given source alphabet consists of 300 words, of which 15 occur with
probability 0.06 each and the remaining 285 words occur with probability
0.00035 each. If 1000 words are transmitted each second, what is the
average rate of information transmission.
4. A numeric keypad has the digits 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. Assume that
the probability of sending any one digit is the same as that for sending any
of the other digits. Calculate how often the buttons must be pressed in
order to send out information at a rate of 2 bits/second.
5. Consider a voice-grade telephone circuit with a bandwidth of 3kHz.
Assume that the circuit can be modelled as an additive white Gaussian
noise (AWGN) channel.
(a) What is the capacity of such a circuit if the SNR is 30dB.
(b) What is the minimum SNR required for a data rate of 4800 bits/s on
such a voice grade circuit?
(c) Repeat part (b) for a data rate of 19200 bits/s.
6. A 100 kbit/s data stream is to be transmitted on a voice-grade telephone
circuit with a bandwidth of 3kHz. Is it possible to achieve error-free
transmission with a SNR of 10dB?
7. Answer the following:
(a) Find the average capacity in bits per second that would be required to
transmit a high-resolution black-and-white TV signal at the rate of 32

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 pictures per second if each picture is made up of 2 × 106 picture
elements (pixels) and 16 different brightness levels. All pixels are
assumed to be independent and all levels have equal likelihood of
occurrence.
(b) For colour TV, this system additionally provides for 64 different
shades of colour. How much more system capacity is required for a
colour system compared to the black-and-white system?
(c) Find the required capacity if 100 of the possible brightness-colour
combinations occur with a probability of 0.003 each, 300 of the
combinations occur with a probability of 0.001, and 624 of the
combinations occur with a probability of 0.00064.
8. Assume that a computer terminal has 110 characters on its keyboard and
that each character is sent using binary words.
(a) What are the number of bits required to represent each character?
(b) How fast can characters be sent (characters/sec) over a telephone line
channel having a bandwidth of 3.2kHz and a signal-to-noise ratio of
20dB?
(c) What is the entropy of each character if each is equally likely to be
sent?
9. In a binary PCM system, if the quantising noise is not to exceed ±P
percent of the peak-to-peak analogue level, show that the number of bits in
each PCM word needs to be
   
50 50
n ≥ (log2 10) log10 = 3.32 log10 .
P P
10. The information in an analogue voltage waveform is to be transmitted over
a PCM system with a ±0.1% accuracy (full scale). The analogue
waveform has an absolute bandwidth of 100Hz and an amplitude range of
−10 to +10V.
(a) Determine the minimum sampling rate needed.

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 (b) Determine the number of bits needed in each PCM word.
(c) Determine the minimum bit rate required in the PCM channel.
(d) Determine the minimum absolute channel bandwidth required for
transmission of this PCM signal.

11. A 40-Mbyte hard disk is used to store PCM data. Suppose that a VF
(voice-frequency) signal is sampled at 8 ksamples/sec and the encoded
PCM is to have an average S/N of at least 30dB. How many minutes of
VF conversation (i.e. PCM data) can be stored on the hard disk?

12. Given an audio signal with spectral components in the frequency band 300
to 3000Hz, assume that a sampling rate of 7kHz will be used to generate a
PCM signal. Design an appropriate PCM system, as follows:
(a) Draw a block diagram of the PCM system including the transmitter,
channel, and receiver.
(b) Specify the number of uniform quantisation levels needed and the
zero-crossing channel bandwidth required, assuming that the peak
signal-to-noise ratio at the receiver output needs to be at least 30dB
and that polar NRZ signalling is used.
(c) Discuss how nonuniform quantisation can be used to improve
performance.

13. A common compression characteristic using in companding is the µ-law

characteristic
ln(1 + µ|ei |)
eo = sign(ei ) ,
ln(1 + µ)
which is normalised for compression over the range −1 to 1. A plot of the
characteristic is shown below:

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 1

0.5
eo

−0.5
µ=5
µ=100
−1
−1 −0.5 0 0.5 1
e
i

(a) Sketch the complete µ = 10 characteristic that will handle input

voltages over the range −5V to +5V.
(b) Plot the corresponding expander characteristic.
(c) Draw a 16-level nonuniform quantiser characteristic that corresponds
to the µ = 10 compression characteristic.
14. For a 4-bit PCM system, calculate and sketch a plot of the output S/N (in
decibels) as a function of the relative input level, 20 log(x rms /V ) for
(a) A PCM system that uses µ = 10 law companding.
(b) A PCM system that uses uniform quantisation (no companding).
Assume that a triangular-type waveform is present at the input so that
√
< |x| >= 3x rms /2. Which of these systems is better to use in practice?
Why?
15. Suppose 100 voltage levels are employed to transmit 100 equally likely
messages. Assume λ = 3.5 and the system bandwidth B = 104 Hz.
(a) Calculate S/η.
(b) If an integrate-and-dump filter is employed to determine which level is
sent, calculate the probability of an error when sending the kth level.
Assume that the only errors possible are in choosing the k − 1 or the
k + 1 levels.

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16. Consider a baseband unipolar communication system with equally likely
signalling:

+ A, 0 < t ≤ T (binary 1)
s(t) =
0, 0 < t ≤ T (binary 0)

Assume that the receiver uses a simple RC LPF with a time constant of
RC = τ where τ = T and 1/T is the bit rate. (By “simple” it is meant
that the initial conditions of the LPF are not reset to zero at the beginning
of each bit interval.)
(a) For signal alone at the receiver input, evaluate the approximate
worst-case signal to ISI ratio (in decibels) out of the LPF at the
sampling time t = t0 = nT , where n is an integer.
(b) Evaluate the signal to ISI ratio (in decibels) as a function of the
parameter K , where t = t0 = (n + K )T and 0 < K ≤ 1.
(c) What is the optimum sampling time to use to maximise the
signal-to-ISI power ratio out of the LPF?
17. For unipolar baseband signalling with pulses

+ A, 0<t ≤T (binary 1)
s(t) =
0, 0<t ≤T (binary 0),

(a) Find the matched-filter frequency response and show how the filtering
operation can be implemented by using an integrate-and-dump filter.
(b) Show that the equivalent bandwidth of the matched filter is
Beq = 1/(2 ∗ T ) = R/2.
18. Equally likely polar signalling is used in an baseband communication
system. Gaussian noise having a PSD of N 0 /2 W/Hz plus a polar signal
with a peak level of A volts is present at the receiver input. The receiver
uses a matched-filter circuit having a voltage gain of 1000.
(a) Find the expression for P as a function of A, N0 , T , and VT , where

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 R = 1/T is the bit rate and VT is the threshold level.
(b) Plot P as a function of VT for the case of A = 8 × 10−3 V,
N0 /2 = 4 × 10−9 W/Hz, and R = 1200 bits/sec.
19. Assume a typical binary sequence and show that if the corresponding
polar NRZ signal and unipolar NRZ signal have the same peak-to-peak
amplitude, the polar signal has less power (an advantage) than the unipolar
signal. If noise is added to these signals, how do the probabilities of bit
errors compare for the two signalling techniques.
20. A binary communication system uses polar signalling. The overall
impulse response is designed to be of the (sin x)/x type so that there will
be no ISI. The bit rate is R = f s = 300 bits/sec.
(a) What is the bandwidth of the polar signal?
(b) Plot the waveform of the polar signal at the system output when the
input binary data is 01100101. Can you discern the data by looking at
this polar waveform?
21. An analogue signal is to be converted into a polar PCM signal and
transmitted over a channel that is absolutely bandlimited to 4kHz. Assume
that 16 quantisation levels are used and that the overall equivalent system
transfer function is of the raised cosine-rolloff type with r = 0.5.
(a) Find the maximum PCM bit rate that can be supported by this system
without introducing ISI.
(b) Find the maximum bandwidth that can be permitted for the analogue
signal.
22. A 1 bit/sec unipolar NRZ signal (rectangular bit shape) is sent over a
bandlimited channel. The channel has the impulse response
h c (t) = e−1000t u(t). Design a 5-tap zero-forcing transversal filter to
equalise the channel response. Assume that h c (t) has significant values
only over the first three bit intervals.
23. A 1 bit/sec binary signal is to be transmitted over a channel. The

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 equivalent impulse response is

e−t , t ≥0
h e (t) =
e−t 2 , t < 0.

(a) Plot the impulse response.

(b) Design a transversal filter to force four points (at the sampling times)
to zero.
(c) Plot the impulse response that includes the zero-forcing equalising
filter.
24. A DM system is tested with a 10kHz sinusoidal signal, 1V peak-to-peak,
at the input. It is sampled at 10 times the Nyquist rate.
(a) What is the step size required to prevent slope overload and to
minimise granular noise?
(b) What is the power of the granular noise?
(c) If the receiver input is bandlimited to 200kHz, what is the
average-signal/quantising-noise power ratio?
25. Assume that the input to a DM is 0.1t 8 − 5t + 2. The step size of the DM
is 1V, and the sampler operates at 10 samples/sec. Over a time interval of
0 to 2 sec, sketch the input waveform, the delta modulator output, and the
integrator output. Denote the granular noise and the slope overload
regions.
26. A delta modulator is to be designed to transmit the information of an
analogue waveform that has a peak-to-peak level of 1V and a bandwidth
of 3.4kHz. Assume that the waveform is to be transmitted over a channel
where the frequency response is extremely poor above 1MHz.
(a) Select the appropriate step size and sampling rate for a sine-wave test
signal and discuss the performance of the system using the parameter
values you have selected.

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(b) If the DM system is to be used to transmit the information of a voice
(analogue) signal, select the appropriate step size when the sampling
rate is 25kHz. Discuss the performance of the system under these
conditions.