Counteraction of non-linear distortion in a novel MCM-DS-SS wireless LAN radio subsystem

A novel radio subsystem for WLAN, based on multicarrier modulation DS-SS, is presented. By comparing the obtained performance with the results of the DS-SS physical layer of the IEEE 802.11 standard, we point out some important architectural aspects and the factors that may limit the performance. In particular, the performance of a base-band pre-distorted non-linear amplifier is analysed by simulations. The analysis of the clipping effect (with and without memory) allows one to specify the optimum back-off value in order to balance the bit error rate performance and the efficiency of power amplifiers.