A method of searching for candidate codewords for a telecommunications system, the method comprising receiving a sequence of constellation points, producing a received FEC vector comprised of bits from the received constellation points, comparing the received FEC vector with a plurality of candidate codewords within a Dorsch decoding process using an ordered pattern, and terminating the search when a candidate codeword from among the plurality of candidate codewords is found residing within a predetermined range of a specified distance of the received FEC vector.