METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR ADAPTIVE RATE SELECTION IN A COMMUNICATION SYSTEM

摘要

A method and an apparatus for adaptive data rate selection in a high data rate (HDR) communication system are disclosed. An exemplary HDR communication system defines a set of data rates, at which an access point (AP) may transmit data packets to an access terminal (AT). The transmission data rate is selected to maintain target packet error rate (PER). Each AT monitors signal quality metric of signals received from APs. An AT receiving forward link signals from multiple ATs identifies the AT associated with the highest quality forward link signal. The AT then evaluates the rate at which a tail probability of error is greater than or equal to a target tail probability of error. The AT then generates a prediction of a first data rate at which the PER of packets received from the identified AP will not exceed the target PER, and a prediction of a second data rate at which the PER of packets received from the selected AP will exceed the target PER. The AT uses the values of the first and second data rates to predict probabilities of selecting the first and the second data rates such that a throughput of the HDR system is maximized and the target PER is achieved. The predicted probabilities are then utilized as biases for a method identifying whether the first data rate or the second data rate will be requested from the AP. The disclosed method and apparatus may be extended to the full set of available data rates.