Diversity combining system employing differential sampling

Claim 1

DIVERSITY COMBINING APPARATUS, COMPRISING A PLURALITY OF DIVERSITY CHANNELS ADAPTED FOR SIMULTANEOUSLY TRANSMISSION OF INDIVIDUAL CHANNEL SIGNALS COMPRISING DIVERSE VARIANTS OF THE SAME BASIC SIGNAL, UTILIZATION CIRCUIT MEANS HAVING AN INPUT, SIGNAL TRANSFER SWITCH MEANS CONNECTED BETWEEN SAID INPUT AND SAID CHANNELS AND OPERABLE TO TRANSFER SIGNALS FROM INDIVIDUAL CHANNELS SELECTIVELY TO SAID INPUT, AND CONTROL MEANS OPERATIVELY CONNECTED TO SAID SWITCH MEANS FOR CONTROLLING SAID CHANNEL SELECTION ACCORDING TO THE COMPARATIVE VALUES OF A PREDETERMINED REFERENCE CONDITION IN THE RESPECTIVE SIGNALS, SAID CONTROL MEANS INCLUDING CONVERSION CIRCUIT MEANS DERIVING FROM THE RESPECTIVE CHANNELS REFERENCE SIGNALS REPRESENTING THE RESPECTIVE REFERENCE CONDITION VALUES, COMPARATOR CIRCUIT MEANS HAVING PRIMARY INPUTS RESPONSIVELY CONNECTED TO THE CONVERSION CIRCUIT MEANS AND SECONDARY INPUT CONNECTIONS INCLUDING REFERENCE TRANSFER SWITCH MEANS OPERABLE TO SELECT AND PERIODICALLY APPLY ONE SUCH CHANNEL REFERENCE SIGNAL TO SAID COMPARATOR CIRCUIT MEANS FOR COMPARISON WITH REFERENCE SIGNALS IN SAID PRIMARY INPUTS, AND MEANS RESPONSIVELY CONNECTED TO SAID COMPARISON CIRCUIT MEANS AND FOR OPERATING SAID SIGNAL TRANSFER SWITCH MEANS AND SAID REFERENCE TRANSFER SWITCH MEANS TO TRANSFER THE SAME TO A DIFFERENT CHANNEL WHEN THE LATTER''S REFERENCE SIGNAL DIFFERS IN A PREDETERMINED DEGREE FROM THAT OF THE CHANNEL PREVIOUSLY SELECTED.