Method and apparatus for equalization and decoding in a wireless communications system including plural receiver antennae

A transceiver, comprising:

• a plurality of MRC receive pathways collectively bearing a received symbol defining modulated data;
• and
• a baseband processing unit for decoding the received symbol, comprising:
• a demodulation unit to generate channel state information and a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the received symbol;
• and
• a Viterbi decoder, comprising:
• a branch metric computation unit to compute a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• a most-likely symbol estimator to estimate a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed by said branch metric computation unit.

A network interface apparatus, comprising:

• a wireless transceiver, comprising:
• a plurality of MRC receive pathways collectively bearing a received symbol defining modulated data;
• and
• a baseband processing unit for decoding the received symbol, comprising:
• a demodulation unit to generate channel state information and a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the received symbol;
• and
• a Viterbi decoder, comprising:
• a branch metric computation unit to compute a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• a most-likely symbol estimator to estimate a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed by said branch metric computation unit;
• and
• a network interface capable of recovering inbound data from the clean symbol.

An information processing apparatus, comprising:

• an information processor;
• and
• a network interface apparatus responsive to said information processor, said network interface apparatus comprising:
• a wireless transceiver, comprising:
• a plurality of MRC receive pathways collectively bearing a received symbol defining modulated data;
• and
• a baseband processing unit for decoding the received symbol, comprising:
• a demodulation unit to generate channel state information and a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the received symbol;
• and
• a Viterbi decoder, comprising:
• a branch metric computation unit to compute a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• a most-likely symbol estimator to estimate a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed by said branch metric computation unit;
• and
• a network interface capable of recovering inbound data from the clean symbol.

A baseband processing unit for decoding a received symbol bearing modulated data, the received symbol capable of being borne across plural receive pathways, the unit comprising:

• means for generating channel state information and a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the received symbol;
• and
• Viterbi decoder means, comprising:
• means for computing a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• means for estimating a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed by said computing means.

A transceiver, comprising:

• means for collectively bearing a received symbol defining modulated data;
• and
• baseband processing means for decoding the received symbol, comprising:
• means for generating channel state information and a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the received symbol;
• and
• Viterbi decoder means, comprising:
• means for computing a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• means for estimating a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed by said computing means.

A network interface apparatus, comprising:

• a transceiver means, comprising:
• means for collectively bearing a received symbol defining modulated data;
• and
• baseband processing means for decoding the received symbol, comprising:
• means for generating channel state information and a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the received symbol;
• and
• Viterbi decoder means, comprising:
• means for computing a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• means for estimating a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed by said computing means;
• and
• means for recovering inbound data from the clean symbol.

An information processing apparatus, comprising:

• information processor means;
• and
• network interface means, comprising:
• transceiver means, comprising:
• means for collectively bearing a symbol defining modulated data;
• and
• baseband processing means for decoding the received symbol, comprising:
• means for generating channel state information and a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the symbol;
• and
• Viterbi decoder means, comprising:
• means for computing a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• means for estimating a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed by said computing means;
• and
• means for recovering inbound data from the clean symbol.

A method for decoding a received symbol bearing modulated data, the received symbol capable of being borne across plural receive pathways, the method comprising:

• generating channel state information from the received symbol;
• generating a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the received symbol;
• computing a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• estimating a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed at said computing step.

A computer program product, comprising computer readable program code causing an information processor to perform the following steps in support of decoding a received symbol bearing modulated data, the received symbol capable of being borne across plural receive pathways, the steps comprising:

• generating channel state information from the received symbol;
• generating a co-phased and summed MRC symbol from the received symbol;
• computing a plurality of branch metrics responsive to and based on the channel state information and the MRC symbol;
• and
• estimating a clean symbol based on the plurality of branch metrics computed at said computing step.