FACTORS NEEDED TO BE CONSIDERED WHILE DESIGNING

ANY DIGITAL COMMUNICATION SYSTEM.

While designing a digital communication system there a number of factors that need to be
considered, the following are the four of the factors needed to be considered while designing
a digital communication system;
 
1. Power.
2. Bandwidth.
3. Performance and complexity of the digital system.
4. Cost efficiency.
Power
• In designing a digital communication system the factor of power must be taken into consideration
in that for any communication system to be able to send or transfer data packets there has to be a
certain minimal power in order to initiate communication or data transfer and hence the designed
communication system has to function at a specified power supply and also tends to establish the
amount of power consumed during communication.
• Power is used with respect to distance, less distance requires less transmit power while large
distance requires greater transmit power. Signal transmitted with minimum power is an efficient
source of energy minimization. Receiver has to maintain a minimum signal to noise power called
Eb/No for successful operation. Transmit power required to transmit a signal represented by Ptx in
free space model is mathematically given by,
 Continuation….
• That is,

Where;
Eb = minimum energy that is required for one bit.
No = noise power spectral density.
n = is spectral efficiency expressed as information rate to bandwidth ratio.
m = noise proportionality constant.
K = Boltzman constant and
T = absolute temperature

this expression represents signal noise.

Continuation….

d = distance in free space model.

is the wavelength of the signal.

Transmitted power of signal depends on distance between transmitter and receiver. If it is short then
less transmit power is required and if it's large then signal has to be transmitted with maximum
power. When distance is greater than sometimes data needs to be retransmitted by using some FEC
code.
Bandwidth
Bandwidth is the range of usable frequencies available for transmitting a signal. In digital
communication systems bandwidth is one of the most important factors to be considered
during design to enhance the reliability and traffic handling capabilities of the system. The
more frequencies available to the communications channel, the more data that can be
transferred at once. While bandwidth is officially measured as a frequency (Hz), it is more
generally reported in bits per second (bps).

Bandwidth for example is the key factor during analog to digital conversion at the sampling
stage where the bandwidth of the channel is made at least twice the maximum frequency
component of the signal to be sampled to enable lossless reconstruction of the signal at the
receiver (the Nyquist criterion) that is oversampling.
Continuation….
Bandwidth also plays an important rule in determining the capacity of the channel used in digital
communication system.
The capacity of the AWGN channel is mathematically expressed as,
Channel capacity C is given by;

Where
B = bandwidth
P = power
No = noise power spectral density.
Performance and complexity of the digital
system.
To evaluate the performance of the digital communication system is decided based on several
performance measure metrics during design which are used to predict the performance of the system.
Performance of the system (digital telecommunication system is very important to be considered
during design since it helps to recognize the reliability and traffic handling capability of the system.
The following are the commonly used performance analysis factors of the digital communication
system;
error correction capability
encoding decoding delay and
error controlling bit overhead.
Complexity of the system, is clearly depicted by the number, type and configuration or arrangement
of the the components to be used for the establishment of the communication system.
During design the complexity of the system should be made optimal to make a chance for easy
maintenance and expansion when needed in the future during implementation.
Cost efficiency
This is the non-technical but commercial factor which is very important factor to be considered in the
designing process of digital communication system. It predicts the expenses of establishing and running the
digital communication system.
Cost efficiency varies as the result of variation in one or all of the other factors.
For example increasing the bandwidth increases the cost of running the system and also increasing the
power (transmit power) increases the costs the same applies for performance and complexity.
Cost efficiency consideration during design helps
to make a clear balance between the expenses of establishing and running the digital communication system
and the price of the services obtained by the customers.
Also the quality of the services may be influenced by this factor.
Determine the level of technology to be used for the system.
To predict the profit to be obtained from the system so that the system can operate longer without perishing.
System established at high costs provides probably expensive services compared to those established at low
costs.