Patent ID: 8213873

Claim:
A method of reporting channel quality from a first communication transceiver comprising: receiving antenna-specific reference signals from a second communication transceiver that supports multi-rank and single-rank transmission to the first communication transceiver; determining whether multi-rank transmission by the second communication transceiver is desired, based on evaluating channel conditions as estimated from the reference signals; and when multi-rank transmission is desired: sending a multi-rank Channel Quality Information (CQI) report to the second communication transceiver that reports two or more CQI values for use in adapting multi-rank transmission to the first communication transceiver, using a reporting order that dictates which reported CQI value or values are reported as absolute values and which reported CQI value or values are reported as offsets relative to one or more of the absolute values, using a bounded differential reporting format; and dynamically determining the reporting order, to reduce under-reporting or over-reporting errors that arise from the use of the bounded differential reporting format.