Signal quality evaluation device, signal quality evaluation value generation method, and reproduction device

Abstract

To obtain a signal quality evaluation value capable of having a high correlation to an error rate and high accuracy for a reproduction signal of high density recording. For the object, an estimated value of a path selection error rate is obtained on the basis of a distribution of a path metric difference between a maximum likelihood path at each time, which is a detection path in maximum likelihood decoding in a PRML decoding system and a second path having a second highest likelihood. Further, an average error bit number in erroneous detection is obtained from a bit difference number between the maximum likelihood path and the second path at the time of path selection of each time in the maximum likelihood decoding. In addition, an estimated bit error rate is obtained from results and an evaluation value according to the estimated bit error rate is generated.