A new frequency domain search strategy in high sensitivity GPS signal acquisition circuit designing

The contradiction between the sensitivity and the frequency domain searching speed of GPS signal acquisition circuit has been discussed for a long time. The signal integration operation which enhances the sensitivity of the system also makes the frequency slots narrower, which affects the speed of the system. In this research a high sensitivity GPS signal acquisition circuit is implemented with a new frequency domain search strategy. The new strategy combines DDS sweep strategy with cyclic shifting sweep strategy which makes the TTFF (time to first fix) reduced evidently. The extra hardware resource cost of the new strategy is acceptable. The speed advantage of the new frequency domain search strategy has been verified by hardware comparison tests.