Patent ID: 7702355

Claim:
A method of selecting one or more cells from which to receive information transmitted on a traffic channel that is not subject to power control in a cellular radio communications system, the method comprising: for each of a plurality of candidate cells, measuring a quality indicative of power of a signal transmitted on the pilot channel and using an offset value that indicates a relationship between the pilot channel transmission power and the traffic channel transmission power associated with the candidate cell to determine a value of quality indicative of power of a signal transmitted on the traffic channel associated with the candidate cell; allocating a selection priority to each of the candidate cells, wherein each allocated selection priority is based, at least in part, on which of a plurality of combining methods can effectively be used with a signal received on the traffic channel from a respective one of the candidate cells; and selecting, based on the values of quality indicative of power of a signal transmitted on the traffic channel and also on the allocated selection priorities of the candidate cells, a number, N, of cells from the plurality of candidate cells, wherein allocating the selection priority to each of the candidate cells comprises: allocating a higher priority to a cell whose received signal transmitted on the traffic channel may be RAKE combined with another cell's signal transmitted on the traffic channel; allocating an intermediate priority to a cell whose received signal transmitted on the traffic channel should not be RAKE combined with any other cell's signal transmitted on the traffic channel but whose received signal transmitted on the traffic channel may be soft combined with another cell's signal transmitted on the traffic channel; and allocating a lower priority to a cell whose received signal transmitted on the traffic channel should neither be RAKE nor soft combined with any other cell's signal transmitted on the traffic channel.