William Stallings

Data and Computer

Chapter 3
Data Transmission

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Electromagnetic Signals
• Employed to transmit voice, data, images,
video, etc.
• Can be analog or digital representation to
convey information
• Major characteristics:
—Bandwidth – width of the range of frequencies – the
greater the bandwidth, the greater its data-carrying
capacity
—Potential for error – digital error less prone to errors
—Acceptable error rate

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Terminology (1)
• Transmitter
• Receiver
• Medium
—Guided medium
• e.g. twisted pair, optical fiber
—Unguided medium (wireless)
• e.g. air, water, vacuum

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Terminology (2)
• Direct link
—No intermediate devices
• Point-to-point
—Direct link
—Only 2 devices share link
• Multi-point
—More than two devices share the link

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Terminology (3)
• Simplex
—One direction
• e.g. Television
• Half duplex
—Either direction, but only one way at a time
• e.g. police radio
• Full duplex
—Both directions at the same time
• e.g. telephone

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Frequency, Spectrum and
Bandwidth
• Time domain concepts
—Analog signal
• Signal intensity varies in a smooth fashion over time (no
breaks)
—Digital signal
• Changes from one constant level to another
—Periodic signal
• Pattern repeated over time
• Sine wave for analog signal
• Square wave for digital signal

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Analog & Digital Signals

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Periodic
Signals

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Sine Wave
• Peak Amplitude (A)
—maximum strength of signal
—Measure in volts
• Frequency (f)
—Rate of change of signal (cycles per second)
—Hertz (Hz) or cycles per second
—Period = time for one repetition (T)
• Phase ()
—Relative position in time

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Varying Sine Waves
s(t) = A sin(2ft +)

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Wavelength
• Distance occupied by one cycle

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Frequency Domain Concepts
• Signal usually made up of many frequencies
• Components are sine waves
• Can be shown (Fourier analysis) that any signal
is made up of component sine waves
• Can plot frequency domain functions

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Addition of
Frequency
Components
(T=1/f)

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Spectrum & Bandwidth
• Spectrum
—range of frequencies contained in signal
• Absolute bandwidth
—width of spectrum
• Effective bandwidth
—Often just bandwidth
—Narrow band of frequencies containing most of the
energy

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Data Rate and Bandwidth
• Any transmission system has a limited band of
frequencies
• This limits the data rate that can be carried

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Analog and Digital Data
Transmission
• Data
—Entities that convey meaning
• Signals
—Electric or electromagnetic representations of data
• Transmission
—Communication of data by propagation and
processing of signals

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Analog and Digital Signals
• Means by which data are propagated
• Analog
—Continuously variable
—Various media
• wire, fiber optic, space
—Speech bandwidth 100Hz to 7kHz
—Telephone bandwidth 300Hz to 3400Hz
—Video bandwidth 4MHz
• Digital
—binary

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Advantages & Disadvantages
of Digital
• Faster
• Less susceptible to noise
• Attenuation

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Attenuation of Digital Signals

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Components of Speech
• Frequency range (of hearing) 20Hz-20kHz
—Speech 100Hz-7kHz
• Easily converted into electromagnetic signal for
transmission
• Sound frequencies with varying volume
converted into electromagnetic frequencies with
varying voltage
• Limit frequency range for voice channel
—300-3400Hz

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Conversion of Voice Input into
Analog Signal

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Binary Digital Data
• From computer terminals etc.
• Two dc components
• Bandwidth depends on data rate

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Conversion of PC Input to
Digital Signal

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Data and Signals
• Usually use digital signals for digital data and
analog signals for analog data
• Can use analog signal to carry digital data
—Modem
• Can use digital signal to carry analog data
—Compact Disc audio
—Codec

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Analog Signals Carrying Analog
and Digital Data

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Digital Signals Carrying Analog
and Digital Data

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Analog Transmission
• Analog signal transmitted without regard to
content
• May be analog or digital data
• Attenuated over distance
• Use amplifiers to boost signal
• Also amplifies noise

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Digital Transmission
• Concerned with content
• Integrity endangered by noise, attenuation etc.
• Repeaters used
• Repeater receives signal
• Extracts bit pattern
• Retransmits
• Attenuation is overcome
• Noise is not amplified

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Advantages of Digital
Transmission
• Digital technology
— Low cost LSI/VLSI technology
• Data integrity
— Longer distances over lower quality lines
• Capacity utilization
— High bandwidth links economical
— High degree of multiplexing easier with digital techniques
• Security & Privacy
— Encryption
• Integration
— Can treat analog and digital data similarly

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Transmission Impairments
• Signal received may differ from signal
transmitted
• Analog - degradation of signal quality
• Digital - bit errors
• Caused by
—Attenuation and attenuation distortion
—Delay distortion
—Noise

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Attenuation
• Signal strength falls off with distance
• Depends on medium
• Received signal strength:
—must be enough to be detected
—must be sufficiently higher than noise to be received
without error
• Attenuation is an increasing function of
frequency

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Delay Distortion
• Only in guided media
• Propagation velocity varies with frequency

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Noise (1)
• Additional signals inserted between transmitter
and receiver
• Thermal
—Due to thermal agitation of electrons
—Uniformly distributed
—White noise

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Noise (2)
• Crosstalk
—A signal from one line is picked up by another
• Impulse
—Irregular pulses or spikes
—e.g. External electromagnetic interference
—Short duration
—High amplitude

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Channel Capacity
• Data rate
—In bits per second
—Rate at which data can be communicated
• Bandwidth
—In cycles per second of Hertz
—Constrained by transmitter and medium

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Required Reading
• Stallings chapter 3

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Chapter 3 Review Questions
• Compare and contrast simplex, half duplex, and full duplex
transmission.
• Differentiate between guided media and unguided media
• Differentiate between an analog and digital electromagnetic signal
• Discuss the advantages of digital transmission
• What is the relationship between the wavelength and frequency of
a sine wave?
• What is the relationship between spectrum and bandwidth;
between bandwidth and data rate; between bandwidth and channel
capacity?
• What key factors affect channel capacity?
• What is attenuation?
• What is noise? Provide examples of noise.

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