Adaptive channel delays selection for WCDMA mobile system

Reliable path selection is a crucial operation prior to RAKE combining in WCDMA. We propose a new adaptive method for path delays selection based on the computation of a dynamic threshold. By computing a power versus delay profile and excluding all the peaks that probably correspond to channel taps, the remaining noise-only samples are statistically modeled. The statistical parameters of the noise/interference are then used to set the tap selection threshold. As a consequence, we ensure that the threshold varies according to the interference level, and therefore the path selection procedure is made more reliable.