Patent ID: 7634250

Claim:
A method of communication, the method comprising: a base transceiver station (BTS) producing a combined digital signal by combining digital signals from multiple forward-link communication channels, wherein the BTS comprises an antenna feed interface that connects to an antenna via a first antenna feed, and to a first signal conditioner via a second antenna feed; the BTS modulating a radio frequency (RF) carrier with the combined digital signal so as to produce a first RF signal representing the combined digital signal produced by the BTS; the BTS providing the first RF signal representing the combined digital signal to the antenna via the first antenna feed, and to the first signal conditioner via the second antenna feed, wherein the antenna subsequently transmits the first RF signal representing the combined digital signal to one or more mobile phones via an air interface; the first signal conditioner receiving, from the BTS via the second antenna feed, the first RF signal representing the combined digital signal; the first signal conditioner demodulating the first RF signal representing the combined digital signal so as to recover the combined digital signal; the first signal conditioner receiving other data traffic from a network that connects to a network interface at the first signal conditioner; the first signal conditioner combining the combined digital signal recovered from the first RF signal and the other data traffic to form combined data traffic; and the first signal conditioner providing the combined data traffic to a shared transport medium for transmission, in turn, to a second signal conditioner.