Performance evaluation of a 3GPP LTE terminal receiver

In this paper we present the evaluation of a receiver signal processing chain for a 3GPP long term evolution (LTE) terminal, including coarse synchronisation, channel estimation, fine synchronisation (tracking), MIMO equalization and detection. Algorithm blocks are first individually explained and simulatively evaluated with a realistic channel model. Adjustments of the blocks to each other for improved robustness are described, like interaction between time synchronization and channel estimation performance. After joint optimization, the performance of the complete chain is evaluated. Practical tradeoffs between complexity and performance are investigated and low-complexity algorithms are used. The presented receiver achieves an implementation loss of about 2 dB compared to perfect synchronization and channel estimation conditions.