Transition-minimized differential signaling

technology for transmitting high-speed serial data

Transition Minimized Differential Signaling (or TMDS) is a standard that is used to transport uncompressed data to a digital device. The data transmitted is digital. By using a digital signal instead of an analogue signal, the impact of Electromagnetic interference on the signal is reduced. This mode of transmission is mainly used for audio and visual data.

TMDS uses 8b/10b encoding. The code set is different from the original, developed by IBM. Encoding is a two-stage process that uses XOR and XNOR gates. Whether to use XOR or XNOR operation is selected, so that the number ofsignal transitions is minimal; this is where the name is from.

S/PDIF is a similar standard, used in consumer audio equipment.