Patent ID: 8081063

Claim:
A method of determining a Q value for use by a radio frequency identification (RFID) tag reader in an inventory round, the inventory round classifying each slot of the inventory round as either an empty slot, a collided slot, or singly occupied slot, the method comprising: (a) determining, by a RFID tag reader, at least one of: a number of empty slots, a number of collided slots, and a number of singly occupied slots, in response to the completion of an inventory round; and (b) applying, by the RFID tag reader, a function to at least one of: the number of empty slots, the number of collided slots, and the number of singly occupied slots, to determine a Q value for another inventory round, wherein applying the function comprises applying a base 2 logarithm function to the sum of (i) the number of singly occupied slots multiplied by a first value and (ii) the number of collided slots multiplied by a second value greater than one.