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Digital Communications Lab (CE-343L)

EXPERIMENT

05

NO

DATE OF
EXPERIMENT

INSTRUCTOR

SUBMITTED BY

1st November ,2012

ADNAN ZAFAR

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Experiment: Differential Pulse-Code Modulation (DPCM) and Delta Modulation

1. Objective
The objective of this lab is to implement differential pulse code modulation (DPCM) and to study the
properties of this method when combined with filtering and transmitted over noisy channels.

2. Equipment
Simulink and the communication Toolbox software are available on your workstations.

2.1

What are DPCM and Delta Modulation?

(1) DIFFERENTIAL PULSE CODE MODULATION: Differential pulse code modulation (DPCM) is
a procedure of converting an analog into a digital signal in which an analog signal is sampled and then
the difference between the actual sample value and its predicted value (predicted value is based on
previous sample or samples) is quantized and then encoded forming a digital value.
DPCM code words represent differences between samples unlike PCM where code words represented
a sample value. Basic concept of DPCM - coding a difference, is based on the fact that most source
signals show significant correlation between successive samples so encoding uses redundancy in
sample values which implies lower bit rate.
Realization of basic concept (described above) is based on a technique in which we have to predict
current sample value based upon previous samples (or sample) and we have to encode the difference
between actual value of sample and predicted value (the difference between samples can be
interpreted as prediction error). Because it's necessary to predict sample value DPCM is form of
predictive coding.
(2) DELTA MODULATION: Delta modulation is a form of signal compression that tries to reduce the
amount of bits that needed to be transmitted by not transmitting the whole value of the signal at every
moment, but only the difference between the current value and the previous value. The receiver keeps
adding the (possibly negative) incoming values to an accumulator, so the original signal can be
recovered.
For signals that change slowly, this is a very good idea: the difference can be expressed with a lower
number of bits. There are two disadvantages of DM: if the signal changes abruptly, the difference
could exceed the allocated number of bits, and if a transmission error occurs, the accumulator stores a
wrong value and the error is propagated to all following samples. Methods exist to mitigate both types
of error: adaptive DM dynamically changes the number of bits allocated to the delta, and the "true"
value of the signal can be periodically transmit to realign the accumulator and reduce the impact of
error propagation.

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Slope Overload Distortion and Granular Noise

1.

Slope overload distortion: This type of distortion is due to the use of a step size delta that is
too small to follow portions of the waveform that have a steep slope. It can be reduced by
increasing the step size.

2.

Granular noise: This results from using a step size that is too large too large in parts of the
waveform having a small slope. Granular noise can be reduced by decreasing the step size.

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LAB Report

Please include the following in your lab report.

1. Include Simulink models for Delta Modulator (Encoder & Decoder).
2. Provide your observation on every result you obtain.
3. Write a paragraph about questions and confusions that you experienced in this lab.