Patent ID: 7286609

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving channel state information associated with a multicarrier wireless communication channel having a plurality of subcarriers, wherein the channel is processed to identify active subcarriers and initial power distribution among the subcarriers; and selecting a bit loading and final power distribution for use in subsequent processing of the subcarriers of the communication channel based, at least in part, on the received channel state information, wherein the bit loading and final power distribution increases channel throughput while guaranteeing a channel quality metric among active subcarriers; wherein selecting a bit loading and final power distribution includes: identifying among the active subcarriers, those which exceed a channel quality performance threshold, said identified subcarriers forming a highest rate subset of subcarriers; calculating an excess power value by determining how much power could be reduced in the identified subcarriers, from the initial power distribution, so that they still meet, but do not exceed, the channel quality performance threshold; and reallocating at least a portion of the excess power from the highest-rate subset of subcarriers to one or more lower-rate subsets of subcarriers.