An algorithm for decoding product codes based on soft-decision decoding of dual codes of the component codes

Product codes have large minimum Hamming distance and their complexity might be compared with Turbo codes. Conventional algorithms for decoding product codes have low decoding performances and very high complexities. In order to ensure the applicability of product codes in practice, this article proposes a method for decoding product codes which provide good decoding performance and acceptable complexity. Simulation results of the proposed algorithm show that, a signal-to-noise ratio of about only 4,1 dB is required in order to produce a bit error ratio (BER) not to exceed10–6 with rate code at 0,7034