US Patent 7848474 Signal timing phase selection and timing acquisition apparatus and techniques

Signal timing phase selection and timing acquisition apparatus and techniques are disclosed. A timing phase that is most closely aligned with a phase of information carried by a received signal is selected from a plurality of timing phases. The selected timing phase may be used, for example, as a reference signal for a phase detector in a Phase-Locked Loop (PLL). The received signal may be sampled one or more times per timing phase. In a multiple-sample implementation, the samples may be used for timing phase selection, for detection of a known initial pattern of a burst of information to thereby detect the start time of a an information burst, or both.