Effect of Bandwidth of Moving Average Filter on Symbol Timing Detection Performance

In the orthogonal frequency division multiplexing system, the prefix inserted between data symbols should be eliminated to apply the Fourier transform on the valid symbol interval. This functional procedure should be based on the accurate symbol timing detection. The symbol timing detection at the receiver side provides the reference for determining the beginning time index of each symbol whose initial point is located at the boundary between the preamble and the payload part. Also, the detection error is one of the main factors in the overall system performance. In this paper the effect of the bandwidth of the moving average filter on the symbol timing detection is discussed. Simulations are carried out to analyze the detection performance for the varying values of the window size of the moving average filter which is related to the filter bandwidth.