Soft decision error correcting line code for optical data storage

In optical storage devices such as the compact disk (CD) benefits arising from the use of FEC exist. Line coding has also been used, mostly in storage devices, to increase the resilience of the message bits by matching the characteristics of the transmitted signal to the channel. It is therefore quite common especially in optical storage devices to require the use of both FEC and LC. An efficient scheme would be to use error correcting line codes (ECLCs) which should offer a higher rate and reduced error extension. One such code, used in conjunction with soft decision decoding (SDD) is presented in this paper. It is termed soft decision error correcting line code (SDECLC) and it exchanges rate (compared to a FEC code) to achieve good LC characteristics.