On the Uplink Achievable Rate of Massive MIMO System with Low-Resolution ADC and RF Impairments

This letter considers channel estimation and uplink achievable rate of the coarsely quantized massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system with radio frequency (RF) impairments. We utilize an additive quantization noise model and an extended error vector magnitude model to analyze the impacts of low-resolution analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) and RF impairments, respectively. We show that hardware impairments cause a nonzero floor on the channel estimation error, which contraries to the conventional case with ideal hardware. The maximal-ratio combining technique is then used at the receiver, and an approximate tractable expression for the uplink achievable rate is derived. The simulation results illustrate the appreciable compensations between ADCs' resolution and RF impairments. The proposed studies support the feasibility of equipping economical coarse ADCs and economical imperfect RF components in practical massive MIMO systems.