A digital broadcast communication system includes a transceiver configured to receive a preamble having one of at least four preamble patterns characterized by a bit pattern and a length, produce the received preamble to each of at least four preamble correlator circuits, and at each correlator circuit, compare the received preamble to a reference code pattern. If a specified level of correlation exists between the received preamble and the reference code, produce an indication that the comparison was favorable. In one embodiment, the transceiver includes 16 correlator circuits and further includes 128 preamble reference codes for detecting preambles that have control, synchronization or data content.