Multipath delay measurement using parallel processing

An efficient model has been developed to estimate the parameters of a slowly fading multipath channel. A spread-spectrum direct sequence signal is used to resolve the path delays and despread the noise. The multipath parameters, including number of paths, path delays, and fading factors, are estimated by finding the approximated eigenvalues of the covariance matrix of the received signal. The multipath estimator is fully implemented by a parallel processing scheme and two fast and high-resolution algorithms, HSNR and LSNR, are developed for this scheme. The computer simulation results show that reliable multipath estimation can be achieved even when multipath time delays are very close in low signal-to-noise ratio. The resolution of multipath time delays can be improved by using a long direct sequence, and the estimation accuracy of fading factors can be achieved by a long-term observation