Bit, tone and cyclic prefix allocation in OFDM with application to In-Home PLC

Abstract

We propose to maximize achievable rate in OFDM systems via the adaptation of the cyclic prefix (CP) length jointly with tone and bit loading. We show that significant gains are obtained compared to the case of using a fixed CP with duration equal to the channel. Several metrics for the CP design are described. They tradeoff between performance and complexity. Both single user and multiuser OFDM are considered. Numerical results are reported for typical power line communication indoor channels.