Patent ID: 6922405

Claim:
A wireless local area network station comprising signal processing mean, carrier detect sensing means, defer behavior sensing means and memory, the network station comprising: means including at least the signal processing means for transmitting and receiving signals within a communication cell associated with an access point, the communication cell being associated with a carrier detect zone and a defer zone; means, including the signal processing means, the carrier detect sensing means, and the defer behavior sensing means, for carrying out an association process between the network station and the access point by transmitting an association request message to the access point and receiving an association response message from the access point during entry of said network station into said communication cell, the network station being coupled to the access point to receive a preferred carrier detect threshold level value and preferred defer behavior threshold level value; and memory for storing the preferred carrier detect threshold level value and the preferred defer behavior threshold level value for use during transmission and reception of signals while being associated with the access point.