Patent ID: 7319680

Claim:
A method for controlling operational states of a medium access control (MAC) layer in a mobile communication system including the MAC layer, the MAC layer supporting an idle state in which no downlink and uplink dedicated control channel and dedicated traffic channel exists and also supporting an active state in which the downlink and the uplink dedicated control channel and the dedicated traffic channel exist, the method comprising the steps of: (a) transitioning to a contention state and then transitioning from the contention state to the active state through contention-based access if there is transmission data in the idle state; (b) transitioning to one of a fast access state and a slow access state according to priority of the data if there is no transmission data in the active state for a preset time; (c) transitioning to the active state through contention-free-based access if there is transmission data in the fast access state; and (d) transitioning to the active state through contention-free-based access if there is transmission data in the slow access state.