Patent ID: 8675794

Claim:
A method, comprising: receiving reference signals in a mobile communication terminal, which is designed to receive data-carrying signals that are transmitted from a base station using one of multiple predefined Modulation and Coding Schemes (MCSs); holding in the communication terminal one or more pre-calculated mappings between Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) and error rate for one or more of the MCSs; adjusting the pre-calculated mappings according to one or more transmission parameters of the data-carrying signals; based on the adjusted mappings, estimating using the received reference signals respective measures indicative of actual spectral efficiencies that are achievable by the MCSs; selecting a preferred MCS based on the estimated measures; computing a preferred number of spatial streams and time-averaging the preferred number of the spatial streams; and sending to the base station feedback that is indicative of the preferred MCS and further indicates the time-averaged preferred number of the spatial streams.