Patent ID: 8644170

Claim:
A method comprising, with at least one wireless communication device of a wireless communication system: determining a data rate for a data transmission over a communication channel in the wireless communication system by: estimating a signal quality for an equivalent communication channel having a flat frequency response across a system bandwidth based, at least in part, on data transmitted over the communication channel; determining a threshold signal quality required for the equivalent communication channel to support a desired level of performance in providing data communication at a particular data rate based, at least in part, on a particular modulation scheme and a particular coding scheme associated with at least one of a plurality of frequency subchannels of the communication channel to be used for the data transmission; determining whether or not the particular data rate is supported by the communication channel based, at least in part, on the estimated signal quality for the equivalent communication channel and the threshold signal quality for the equivalent communication channel: and wherein estimating the signal quality further comprises: identifying a set of parameters associated with at least the particular coding scheme and the particular modulation scheme to be used for the data transmission; and estimating one or more characteristics of the communication channel, wherein the one or more estimated characteristics of the communication channel comprise an estimated frequency response of the communication channel and an estimated noise variance of the communication channel.