Patent ID: 8582484

Claim:
A method for transmitting data packets from a radio control entity to a mobile node in a unicast and multicast transmission mode, wherein a re-transmission protocol uses a plurality of processes for the transmission of the unicast and multicast data packets, the re-transmission protocol using a receiving buffer in the mobile node, comprising a plurality of regions each associated with one of the plurality of processes of the re-transmission protocol, to store therein received data packets, which could not be decoded correctly by the mobile node, for later use with corresponding re-transmission data packets, the method comprising the steps of: configuring the receiving buffer of the re-transmission protocol in the mobile node for use with the unicast and the multicast transmission mode, wherein the receiving buffer is divided into a unicast section and a multicast section, and the plurality of regions of the receiving buffer with the associated plurality of processes are distributed among the unicast and multicast section, informing the radio control entity about the distribution of the regions of the receiving buffer and the associated processes among the unicast section and the multicast section, transmitting by the radio control entity a unicast data packet and a Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request (HARQ) process ID to the mobile node, wherein the unicast data packet is assigned to a process belonging to the unicast section of the receiving buffer based on the received HARQ process ID, transmitting by the radio control entity a multicast data packet to the mobile node, and deciding on, by the mobile node, the HARQ process ID belonging to the multicast section of the receiving buffer, wherein the multicast data packet is assigned to the decided process belonging to the multicast section of the receiving buffer.