On the performance of turbo product codes over partial response channels

This paper evaluates the performance of single-parity check turbo product codes (TPC/SPC) over partial response channels. A rate-0.94 and a rate-0.89 TPC/SPC code are considered for use with PR4/EPR4 channels with proper precoding and with turbo equalization. Gains of 4.5 to 5 dB are obtained at BER of 10/sup -5/, revealing performance comparable to that of low density parity check codes. Apart from its linear encoding/decoding complexity and highly parallelizable decoding algorithm, TPC/SPC codes demonstrate favorable error statistics which are in harmony with the outer Reed-Solomon error correction code (RS-ECC), indicating it to be a promising candidate for future recording systems.