Method and apparatus for measuring the strength of a radio signal frequency
US4549311A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | Mar 20, 1985 |
| Grant date | Oct 22, 1985 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Mar 20, 2005 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
- CPC primaryH04B7/0808
- WIPO fieldTelecommunications
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
An improved method and apparatus for measuring the strength of a radio frequency (RF) signal subject to Rayleigh fading is described. The strength of the RF signal is sampled two or more times during a predetermined time interval and the sampled signal strength having the largest magnitude is selected. The selected signal strength is a reasonably accurate measure of the signal strength since the true average strength of a Rayleigh fading signal is close to its peak signal strength. The inventive method and apparatus is particularly well adapted for use in a scanning receiver located in a base station radio of a cellular radiotelephone communications system. The scanning receiver includes an antenna selector for selecting one of a plurality of sector antennas, an RF signal receiver tunable to a plurality of different RF signal frequencies, an analog-to-digital converter for converting RF signal strength samples to a binary data signal, and a microprocessor together with peripheral devices for controlling the operation of the antenna selector, RF signal receiver and analog-to-digital converter.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.