Repeater bandwidth, radio configuration, and ADC clock speed adjustment

• US 10,567,069 B2
• Filed: 04/28/2016
• Issued: 02/18/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 04/28/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NETGEAR, Inc.
• Original Assignee: NETGEAR, Inc.
• Inventors: Emmanuel, Joseph Amalan Arul, Amini, Peiman
• Primary Examiner(s): Choudhry, Samina F
• Application Number:
  US15/141,662
• Publication Number:
  US 20170317739A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,391 Days
• Field of Search: 370252
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/15542 Selecting at relay station its transmit and receive resources selection of wireless resources by user or terminal H04W72/02; arrangements affording multiple use of the transmission path by two-dimensional division of the resources H04L5/0003, or by allocating sub-channels H04L5/003
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0215 based on user or device properties, e.g. MTC-capable devices services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC] H04W4/70; wireless resource selection or allocation plan definition based on terminal or device properties H04W72/51
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0236 radio quality, e.g. interference, losses or delay
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/51 based on terminal or device properties
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/541 using the level of interference

Abstract

In a repeater, a mechanism checks multiple parameters and makes repeater bandwidth, radio configuration, and ADC clock speed adjustments. multiple repeater parameters are checked and the repeater bandwidth is optimized based upon any of adjusting bandwidth based on best throughput; adjusting bandwidth based on Internet speed; adjusting mapping based on overlapping access points (106); adjusting bandwidth based on the client'"'"'s range; adjusting ADC clock speed; adjusting transmit (TX) radio setting based on associated clients; adjusting receive (RX) radio setting based on associated clients; client type considerations; and adjusting CPU settings based on clients or backhaul. In embodiments, for example, bandwidth can be adjusted from 80 MHz to 40 MHz to 20 MHz or a smaller bandwidth, e.g. 5 MHz, for an 802.11ac/11ax/11ac device. For an 802.11n/a/b/g/ah device, bandwidth can adjusted using from 40 MHz to 20 MHz to a smaller bandwidth, e.g. 1 MHz, 2 MHz, or 5 MHz.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method for operation of a repeater in conjunction with an access point, comprising:

checking multiple repeater parameters by a processor communicatively coupled with the repeater; and

setting repeater bandwidth by the processor executing instructions in a memory, the instructions causing the processor to set repeater bandwidth based upon adjusting mapping based on overlapping access points, said adjusting mapping based on overlapping access points further comprising;

adjusting mapping based on an overlapping AP comprising;

checking overlapping APs and their channel;

taking into account interference;

using interference as a parameter to select bandwidth; and

checking a canonical correlation analysis (CCA) statistic and preamble misdetection to determine that interference does not result in collisions and a less efficient MAC layer.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

adjusting bandwidth to maximize throughput (TPUT) between a client that is associated with a repeater and a home access point (AP) by any of;

using a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the access point to which the repeater is connecting to determine if a link to the access point is adequate for a particular bandwidth, wherein when the SNR is higher than a predetermined threshold, a higher bandwidth is selected;

monitoring noise and interference level in a frequency of use to determine how wide of a channel can be selected without having in-channel or in-band interference;

monitoring the SNR of clients associated to the repeater over time, wherein when the SNR does not meet a higher bandwidth threshold, the bandwidth is reduced;

periodically reducing bandwidth to determine if there are new clients that can associate with the repeater; and

periodically checking on the repeater to identify which bandwidth provides the best SNR and signal-to-noise-and-interference ratio (SINR), wherein bandwidth is adjusted to limit delay and delay jitter to support real time traffic, as opposed to providing maximum TPUT, and wherein the SNR is calculated from any of;

both a received signal strength indication (RSSI) of the AP to which the repeater is connecting, which is monitored using beacons and other frames, and noise on a channel that is measured during idle receptions; and

a predefined field of a packet preamble or the pilot signals during packet reception using a PHY level calculation on a baseband processing portion of an 802.11 chipset.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

adjusting throughput based upon Internet speed, comprising;

the repeater running a speed check from itself to a backbone and takes Internet speed as a parameter;

measuring speed between the AP and the repeater; and

adjusting bandwidth accordingly.

4. The method of claim 3, said repeater speed check further comprising:

downloading a file of known size; and

measuring a time of download, where speed is file size/time.

5. The method of claim 3, said repeater speed check further comprising:

determining path rate by preliminary measurements and tests, packet pair probing, and asymptotic dispersion rate (ADR).

6. The method of claim 3, said repeater speed check further comprising:

using path load to estimate available bandwidth of an end-to-end path from the repeater (S) to a Backbone®

, wherein available bandwidth comprises the maximum IP-layer throughput that a flow can get in a path from S to R, without reducing the rate of the rest of traffic in the path.

7. The method of claim 3, said repeater speed check further comprising:

the repeater obtaining Internet speed from the AP;

the repeater receiving the Internet speed; and

the repeater selecting a smaller bandwidth when the Internet speed is low and the environment is relatively noisy.

8. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

calculating values for noise based on an SNR required for a selected bandwidth to provide a selected TPUT.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

the repeater learning over time a level of noise with which the AP can properly receive at a certain bandwidth.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

collecting medium availability information with a wireless receiver;

the MAC layer using said medium availability information to determine when a packet can be transmitted; and

the MAC layer collecting said medium availability information as CCA statistics for use by the receiver.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

checking a request-to-send/clear-to-send (RTS/CTS) dynamic bandwidth signaling to determine which bandwidth is to be used and to adapt the bandwidth accordingly.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

checking a low power device to determine if beacon delay and packet collision is minimized on the low power device.

13. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

adjusting bandwidth based on the client'"'"'s range comprising;

said repeater adjusting bandwidth based on distance or signal strength of clients that associate to said client;

once the repeater is setup and clients are associated to it, said repeater finding a bandwidth that results in minimal desired TPUT for set of clients the repeater supports;

when for a client associated to repeater a large bandwidth of the repeater results in less TPUT, more delay, or packet retries than desired, the repeater dropping the bandwidth;

when all clients associated to repeater are in close distance, the repeater using a larger bandwidth and other receiver settings which are optimized for close range clients.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

said repeater periodically determining if it can hear a probe request, association request, or authentication request using smaller bandwidth which results in longer range, or using receiver settings which are optimized for longer range; and

when new clients associate to the repeater from a longer range, the repeater reassessing the bandwidth and receiver settings for the new clients.

17. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

adjusting receive (RX) radio setting based on associated clients, comprising;

optimizing a receiver setting for more or less range depending on the associated clients;

the receiver using settings which result in the best noise figure (NF) for close range clients;

said receiver changing packet processing thresholds to process only close range transmission;

when there are clients far away, the receiver using gain and packet threshold settings which are best for long range; and

when the receiver is only processing close by clients, the receiver periodically changing its coverage settings to determine if there are any new clients that should be serviced.

19. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

adjusting CPU settings based on clients or backhaul, comprising;

selecting parameters for a CPU clock, a number of cores a CPU uses, cores that are used to process packets, and CPU affinity to WiFi chipsets depending on any of type of data rates to be supported by said CPU, delay requirements, and power consumption requirements;

reducing any of the CPU clock speed and number of CPU cores when all clients in communication with the repeater are far away or sending at a low data rate.

22. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

instructions causing the processor to set repeater bandwidth based upon a determined optimal throughput.

15. A computer implemented method for operation of a repeater in conjunction with an access point, comprising:

checking multiple repeater parameters by a processor communicatively coupled with the repeater; and

setting repeater bandwidth by the processor executing instructions in a memory, the instructions causing the processor to set repeater bandwidth based upon adjusting analog-to-digital converter (ADC) clock speed, said adjusting analog-to-digital converter (ADC) clock speed further comprising any of;

adjusting ADC clock speed when the bandwidth is dropped to avoid ADC clock noise by sending commands to an ADC module to change the ADC settings;

modifying ADC clock speed to reduce quantization error at a lower frequency compared to a higher frequency;

dropping ADC clock speed to reduce power consumption and operating decrease temperature;

adjusting ADC clock speed to avoid harmonics and cross talk and out-of-band emissions to pass regulatory requirements at a highest power level; and

changing ADC clock speed and examining radio input to determine if there are harmonics that are based on changes to the ADC clock speed, wherein when changes to the ADC clock speed create noise and/or harmonics, the repeater choses a clock speed which results in less noise and/or harmonics.

16. A computer implemented method for operation of a repeater in conjunction with an access point, comprising:

checking multiple repeater parameters by a processor communicatively coupled with the repeater; and

setting repeater bandwidth by the processor executing instructions in a memory, the instructions causing the processor to set repeater bandwidth based upon adjusting transmit (TX) radio setting based on associated clients, said adjusting transmit (TX) radio setting based on associated clients further comprising;

adjusting transmit (TX) radio settings based on associated clients, comprising;

the repeater adjusting a transmit setting;

when clients are close-by and support high order modulation, the repeater using transmitter settings that are optimized for close range clients and not for far range clients by dropping transmit gain for more linear amplification; and

when the transmitter is using power for a certain modulation, the transmitter dropping transmit power to improve an error vector magnitude (EVM) and increase throughput.

18. A computer implemented method for operation of a repeater in conjunction with an access point, comprising:

checking multiple repeater parameters by a processor communicatively coupled with the repeater; and

setting repeater bandwidth by the processor executing instructions in a memory, the instructions causing the processor to set repeater bandwidth based upon adjusting bandwidth based on client type, comprising;

for a client having a poor receiver or transmitter based on packets the repeater sends to a client and the ACKs it receives, and/or based on the packets the repeater receives from a particular client, the repeater setting a lower bandwidth;

and further comprising any of;

taking performance of clients associated with the repeater into account as a parameter when picking the bandwidth;

taking beacon timing into account for low power clients, where one or more clients indicate to the repeater or AP their power requirement during an association phase by using fields already defined in a specification, or by using a vendor defined information element in a problem request, association request, and authentication request, where the client indicates to a repeater or AP its power sensitivity;

taking traffic type of a client into account for bandwidth considerations, where smaller bandwidth is used for low bandwidth real time traffic; and

the repeater or AP identifying a type of traffic client sent by checking layer 2 or layer 4 priority and/or by performing deep packet inspection (DPI) and classifying the type of traffic further.

20. A computer implemented method for operation of a repeater in conjunction with an access point, comprising:

checking multiple repeater parameters by a processor communicatively coupled with the repeater; and

setting repeater bandwidth by the processor executing instructions in a memory, the instructions causing the processor to set repeater bandwidth based upon adjusting repeater transmit power amplifier supply voltage based on any of needs of clients that said repeater is servicing and a link to an access point; and

checking a received signal strength indication (RSSI) of the access point and clients that the repeater is talking to and estimating a distance based on the RSSI to determine when to drop said power amplifier supply voltage;

wherein when another side of a link is proximate to the repeater, said power amplifier supply voltage is dropped; and

wherein when extra transmit power is required, a higher power amplifier supply voltage is used.

21. A computer implemented method for operation of a repeater in conjunction with an access point, comprising:

checking multiple repeater parameters by a processor communicatively coupled with the repeater; and

setting repeater bandwidth by the processor executing instructions in a memory, the instructions causing the processor to set repeater bandwidth based upon adjusting a number of transmit or receive chains in a multiple input multiple output (MIMO) wireless system; and

determining a number of chains to be used based on any of a received signal strength indication (RSSI), a number of packets sent recently, ACKs received, and an amount of data or TX or RX duty cycle to another side of a link;

wherein when there is little data to be sent, the other side of the link does not require multiple chains for transmission and/or reception, using a lesser number of chains to transmit or receive;

wherein where there are clients that are far and need to be addressed, using more transmit and receive chains;

wherein when there is a high TPUT application, more chains are used to maximize TPUT and link reliability; and

wherein when temperature exceeds a predetermined threshold, the number of chains used is dropped to aid in cooling down the repeater.