$re = '/^(?:(\d+)\s*)?(A|B|DF|XY)(?:\s*(\d+))?$/m';
$str = 'A1234
B 1239
1A123
12A123
1A 1234
12 A 123
1234 B 123456789
12 XY 1234567890';
preg_match_all($re, $str, $matches, PREG_SET_ORDER, 0);
// Print the entire match result
var_dump($matches);
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php