Patent ID: 7103020

Claim:
A radio communication apparatus, comprising: a physical layer portion and a higher layer portion coupled for communication therebetween; a radio block port for coupling to a physical radio channel, said radio block port for receiving a sequence of radio blocks that each include communication information associated with operations of said higher layer portion, each said radio block facilitating transmission of its associated communication information on the physical radio channel; said physical layer portion including a plurality of individually configurable transport channels coupled between said radio block port and said higher layer portion for interfacing between said radio block port and said higher layer portion, said transport channels collectively operable for extracting the communication information from said radio blocks, each of said transport channels including a configuration input for receiving transport format information associated with a current radio block of said sequence, said transport format information indicative of how the associated transport channel is to be configured for operation on the current radio block; each said transport channel having an enable input for selectively enabling and disabling said transport channel, each said transport channel operable when enabled for extracting from the current radio block an associated portion of the communication information in the current radio block and for providing the extracted communication information portion to said higher layer portion, each said transport channel, when disabled, refraining from extracting its associated communication information portion from the current radio block; a controller coupled to said enable inputs of said transport channels for enabling one of said transport channels while maintaining another of said transport channels disabled; and said higher layer portion including a decision maker responsive to the communication information portion provided by said one transport channel for deciding whether to enable said another transport channel, said controller coupled to said decision maker for enabling said another transport channel in response to an enable indication from said decision maker.