Data transmission system employing clock-enriched data coding and sub-harmonic de-multiplexing

Abstract

A method for use in a data transmission system comprises the steps of: (i) adding timing information to a serial data stream; (ii) recovering the timing information from the serial data stream to generate a plurality of clock signals associated with the timing information, each clock signal having a common frequency and a different phase associated therewith, the common frequency being less than a frequency associated with the serial data stream; and (iii) converting the serial data stream to a plurality of parallel data streams respectively using the plurality of clock signals. The timing information may be added to the serial data stream at a data transmitter portion of the system. The invention provides for various ways to add the timing information to the serial data stream, i.e., enrich the serial data stream with the timing information. This timing information is preferably phase locked to the data and has a frequency less than the serial data transmission rate. Recovery of this lower speed timing information, e.g., clock tones, may be performed via filtering and phase aligning the timing information to generate the plurality of clock signals. Conversion of the serial data stream to the plurality of parallel data streams may then include using the clock signals to respectively sample or de-multiplex the serial data stream to yield the plurality of parallel data streams. The parallel data streams have a clock rate lower than that associated with the received serial data stream.