Partial response maximum likelihood equalization for high speed serial link systems

In this paper, a partial response (PR) maximum likelihood equalization which is different from conventional decision feedback equalization (DFE) is explored for heavy loss channels of high speed serial link systems. By setting the PR coefficients equal to that of DFE, a good PR can be obtained. In addition, compared to the symbol and symbol detection (SSD) based DFE, PRML sequence detection can obtain a better performance based on Viterbi algorithm. Simulation results for 4 different channels show that PRML sequence detection can outperform conventional DFE with a detection gain of about 2~3 dB.