Enhanced SNR estimates from direct-sequence spread-spectrum demodulator statistics

Demodulator statistics are used in a binary direct-sequence spread-spectrum receiver to improve the performance of a well-known signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) estimate for ratios of the binary symbol energy to one-sided noise density that are below approximately 7 dB. The new estimate requires no pilot symbols, training sequences, data symbol decisions, or channel measurements, and it can be obtained prior to decoding.