Antenna activity detection in multi-antenna communication

A method for dynamic selection of an equalizer in a multi-antenna communication device, the method comprising:

• identifying, based on a received signal strength indicator value corresponding to each of a plurality of antennas, one or more potentially inactive antennas from the plurality of antennas;
• tagging each of the potentially inactive antennas having a variation in burst differences less than a first threshold value as an inactive antenna and each of the potentially inactive antennas having the variation in the burst differences greater than the first threshold value as an active antenna, wherein a burst difference for a potentially inactive antenna is a difference between RSSI values of two consecutive bursts of a signal received by the potentially inactive antenna;
• and
• initiating an equalizer based at least on a number of antennas tagged as active antenna.

An antenna activity detector comprising:

• a processor, wherein the processor is coupled to a memory that stores a computer program, which when executed by the processor causes the processor to
• compute a received signal strength indicator (RSSI) value for each of a plurality of antennas based on sampled data associated with each of the plurality of antennas;
• identify, from the plurality of antennas, a primary antenna and one or more auxiliary antennas based on the RSSI values corresponding to each of the plurality of antennas, wherein the primary antenna is an antenna having a highest RSSI value, and wherein the auxiliary antennas are antennas having the RSSI value less than the highest RSSI value;
• ascertain one or more potentially inactive antennas from the auxiliary antennas based on the RSSI values;
• determine one or more inactive antennas from the one or more potentially inactive antennas, based at least in part on the RSSI values corresponding to each of the one or more potentially inactive antennas, wherein the determined one or more inactive antennas are faulty or grounded antennas;
• determine a number of active antennas based at least on an indication of one or more inactive antennas;
• and
• initiate an equalizer based at least on the number of active antennas.

A communication device comprising:

• a processor, wherein the processor is coupled to a memory that stores a computer program, which when executed by the processor causes the processor to
• identify, from a plurality of antennas, a primary antenna and one or more auxiliary antennas based on received signal strength indicator (RSSI) values corresponding to each of the plurality of antennas, wherein the primary antenna is an antenna having a highest RSSI value, and wherein the auxiliary antennas are antennas having the RSSI value less than the highest RSSI value;
• ascertain one or more potentially inactive antennas from the auxiliary antennas based on the RSSI values;
• determine one or more inactive antennas from the one or more potentially inactive antennas based on a variation in at least two burst differences, wherein a burst difference for a potentially inactive antenna is a difference between RSSI values of two consecutive bursts of a signal received by the potentially inactive antenna;
• and
• select one of a single antenna equalization and a multi-antenna equalization based on the one or more inactive antennas.