Performance of the Raised-Cosine and "Better Than Raised-Cosine" Pulses in Non-Data-Aided Symbol Timing-Error Detection

The performances of non-data-aided feedback-loop symbol timing synchronization operating with the raised-cosine and the "better than" raised-cosine pulses are investigated. In terms of the jitter variance, modified Cramer-Rao bounds are compared and the individual effects of additive channel noise, self-noise, and their product on jitter variance are also investigated for the two pulses. The better than raised-cosine pulse is shown to have better synchronization performance than the conventional raised-cosine pulse. The gain is, for example, as much as 1.4 dB for excess bandwidth of 0.35 without a prefilter and is larger when the excess bandwidth is smaller or a prefilter is employed.