Method,communications system and receiver for transmitting data in packet form

A method of operating a high speed, error-free data transmission system in a noisy medium includes compressing data determined to be compressible, forward error correcting the data and interleaving the data in a bit matrix memory to enhance the forward error correction. Digital information packets are formulated including a header bearing a packet number, the total packet byte count, any packet number resend request, the data byte count of the actual data and a CRC. The digital information packet is loaded onto a transmitter carousel having a fixed number of sectors. The receiver receives the data, requests resend of any packet (by number) that is defective, error corrects if necessary and sequentially loads the packet onto a receiver carousel. Packets or sequential packet groups are removed from the carousel, selectively decompressed and the data words extracted and sent to the output.