Reducing power consumption by taking advantage of superior in-circuit duplexer performance

• US 8,842,582 B2
• Filed: 06/04/2010
• Issued: 09/23/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 06/04/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Inventors: Gudem, Prasad S., Lau, Soon-Seng, Liu, Li
• Primary Examiner(s): CHO, HONG SOL
• Application Number:
  US12/794,195
• Publication Number:
  US 20110299434A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,572 Days
• Field of Search: 370276-279, 370/282, 370/293
• US Class Current: 370/278
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 1/109 by improving strong signal performance of the receiver when strong unwanted signals are present at the receiver input
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 1/525 with means for reducing leakage of transmitter signal into the receiver
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0238 where the received signal is an unwanted signal, e.g. interference or idle signal
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

Although the duplexer in a full-duplex transceiver circuit may only be guaranteed by the duplexer manufacturer to have a transmit band rejection from its TX port to its RX port of a certain amount, and may only be guaranteed to have a receive band rejection of another amount, the actual transmit band rejection and the actual receive band rejection of a particular instance of the duplexer may be better than specified. Rather than consuming excess power in the receiver and/or transmitter in order to meet performance requirements assuming the duplexer only performs as well as specified, the duplexer'"'"'s in-circuit performance is measured as part of a transmitter-to-receiver isolation determination. Transmitter and/or receiver power settings are reduced where possible to take advantage of the measured better-than-specified in-circuit duplexer performance, while still meeting transceiver performance requirements. Power settings are not changed during normal transmit and receive mode operation.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

tuning a transmitter of a device to output a signal in a transmit band;

tuning a receiver of the device to receive in the transmit band;

receiving the signal at the receiver;

based on the received signal, determining a transmit band leakage power at an input of the receiver, the transmit band leakage power associated with the transmit band;

if the determined transmit band leakage power is less than a threshold, decreasing a power setting for the receiver; and

if the determined transmit band leakage power satisfies the threshold, increasing the power setting for the receiver.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein determining the transmit band leakage power comprises:

determining a receive power reading; and

using a receiver gain value and the receive power reading to determine the transmit band leakage power at the input of the receiver.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising tuning the receiver to receive in a receive band to engage in a communication while the receiver has the increased power setting or the decreased power setting, wherein the transmit band is different than the receive band.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the receiver is tuned to receive in the transmit band prior to tuning the transmitter to output the signal in the transmit band, wherein the transmit band extends from approximately 1920 megahertz (MHz) to approximately 1980 MHz, and wherein the receive band extends from approximately 2110 MHz to approximately 2170 MHz.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the transmitter and the receiver are included in a full-duplex transceiver integrated circuit.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein decreasing the power setting comprises setting a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) within the receiver to consume a smaller amount of current, and wherein increasing the power setting comprises setting the VCO to consume a larger amount of current.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein a portion of the signal output by the transmitter passes through a duplexer and is received by the receiver, and wherein the transmit band leakage power indicates a power of the portion of the signal.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein tuning the transmitter to output the signal includes tuning the transmitter to output the signal at a transmit frequency, and further comprising determining multiple transmit band leakage power levels associated with a plurality of respective values of the transmit frequency.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the transmitter is tuned to output the signal at a transmit frequency, and wherein the receiver is tuned to receive at the transmit frequency.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the transmitter is tuned to output the signal at a transmit frequency, and wherein the receiver is tuned to receive at a frequency that has an offset with respect to the transmit frequency.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein decreasing the power setting comprises supplying a portion of the receiver with a lower supply current, and wherein increasing the power setting comprises supplying the portion of the receiver with a higher supply current.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein decreasing the power setting comprises supplying a portion of the receiver with a lower supply voltage, and wherein increasing the power setting comprises supplying the portion of the receiver with a higher supply voltage.

13. An apparatus comprising:

a transmitter configured to output a signal in a transmit band;

a receiver configured to be tuned to receive within the transmit band to receive the signal output by the transmitter and further configured to generate a receive power reading indicating a power of the signal received by the receiver; and

a processor configured to determine a transmit band leakage power at an input of the receiver in the transmit band based at least in part on the receive power reading, wherein the processor is further configured to cause the receiver to decrease a power setting in response to the determined transmit band leakage power being less than a threshold and to cause the receiver to increase the power setting in response to the determined transmit band leakage power satisfying the threshold.

14. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the processor is further configured to determine the transmit band leakage power based in part on the receive power reading and further based on a receiver gain value.

15. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the transmitter is configured to output the signal in the transmit band at a particular transmit output power.

16. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the transmitter and the receiver are included in a wideband code division multiple access (W-CDMA) full-duplex transceiver of an integrated circuit.

17. An apparatus comprising:

a transmitter configured to be tuned to a transmit band and to output a signal within the transmit band;

a receiver configured to be tuned to the transmit band to receive the signal; and

means for determining a transmit band leakage power of the signal when the signal is received at an input of the receiver, wherein the transmit band leakage power is based at least in part on a receive power reading indicative of a power of the signal received at the input of the receiver, wherein if the determined transmit band leakage power is less than a threshold, the means for determining the transmit band leakage power of the signal causes the receiver to decrease a power setting, and wherein if the determined transmit band leakage power satisfies the threshold, the means for determining the transmit band leakage power of the signal causes the receiver to increase the power setting.

18. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein the signal output by the transmitter is output at a particular transmit output power.

19. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein the means for determining the transmit band leakage power of the signal is configured to determine the power of the signal as received at the input of the receiver by adjusting the receive power reading using a receiver gain value.

20. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein the transmit band is a band associated with a wideband code division multiple access (W-CDMA) full-duplex communication.

21. A processor-readable non-transitory medium storing processor-executable instructions executable by a processor to:

cause a transmitter of a device to be tuned to output a signal in a transmit band;

cause a receiver of the device to be tuned to the transmit band to receive the signal output by the transmitter and to generate a receive power reading indicative of a power of the signal as received by the receiver; and

determine a transmit band leakage power at an input of the receiver in the transmit band based at least in part on the receive power readding, wherein if the determined transmit band leakage power is less than a threshold, the receiver increases a power setting, and wherein if the determined transmit band leakage power satisfies the threshold, the receiver increases the power setting.