RS codes are also good for contexts where you don't know where the errors are. The codes are always maximum distance separable, and the algorithms to locate th

RS codes are also good for contexts where you don't know where the errors are. The codes are always maximum distance separable, and the algorithms to locate the errors are quite efficient. In my experience, LDPC is usually better for soft-decision decoding, where you have information about how reliable each bit is. RS is usually better for hard-decision where you don't know anything about the error locations. Also LDPC is usually bit-oriented, and RS is always a symbol-oriented code, so RS works well for burst errors.