DYNAMIC SPECTRUM ALLOCATION (DSA) AND RECONFIGURABILITY

The present invention provides methods for combining antenna diversity and gain control in a communications system using a single chain of receiver electronics. A number of input parameters related to various characteristics of a received signal are used to determine the quality of the received signal. The antenna diversity and gain control procedures are enabled or disabled based on the signal quality. The antenna diversity procedure estimates the signal level of the non-operational antenna using an infinite impulse response digital filter. The gain control procedure selects one of three gain paths based on the received signal strength.