Subcarrier adaptive thresholding

A method comprising:

• receiving a plurality of signals carried through a channel on a plurality of subcarriers;
• estimating effects of the channel exhibited at each of the subcarrier frequencies;
• and
• adjusting a power threshold based at least in part on the estimated effects of the channel, wherein a first modulation technique is to be used on a given subcarrier if the power of the signal carried on the given subcarrier meets or exceeds the power threshold, and a second modulation technique is to be used on the given subcarrier if the power of the signal carried on the given subcarrier falls short of the power threshold.

A system comprising:

• a transceiver arranged to receive data from a remote transmitter on a plurality of subcarriers;
• an omnidirectional antenna coupled to the transceiver;
• a channel estimator coupled to the receiver and operable for producing a channel estimate;
• a controller coupled to the transceiver and to the channel estimator to receive the channel estimate, to create modulation criteria based at least in part on the channel estimate, and to command the remote transmitter, on a subcarrier-by-subcarrier basis, to employ a particular modulation technique on a particular subcarrier based at least in part on a comparison of the channel estimate and the modulation criteria.

A machine accessible medium that provides instructions, which when accessed, causes the machine to perform operations comprising:

• receiving a plurality of signals carried through a channel on a plurality of subcarriers;
• estimating effects of the channel exhibited at each of the subcarrier frequencies;
• and
• adjusting a power threshold based at least in part on the estimated effects of the channel, wherein a first modulation technique is to be used on a given subcarrier if the power of the signal carried on the given subcarrier meets or exceeds the power threshold, and a second modulation technique is to be used on the given subcarrier if the power of the signal carried on the given subcarrier falls short of the power threshold.