Performance of coded DS-CDMA with pilot-assisted channel estimation and linear interference suppression

We consider a direct sequence (DS-) code division multiple access (CDMA) system with orthogonally multiplexed pilot signals and minimum mean squared error (MMSE) data and channel estimation. Both flat and frequency-selective fading channels are considered. Large system analysis is used to optimize the pilot-to-data power ratio (PDR) and the code rate for a fixed bandwidth expansion. Specifically, the PDR is selected to minimize the probability of error subject to a constraint on transmitted power. When the MMSE filter estimates the channel of the desired user, but averages over the channels of the interferers (corresponding to an adaptive filter in moderate to fast fading), the optimal PDR is less than that for the matched filter (MF). That is, the MMSE filter benefits from allocating more power to the data. When the MMSE filter directly incorporates estimates of all users' channel coefficients, the optimal PDR is greater than that for the MF. System performance as a function of code rate is characterized through both probability of error and cutoff rate. The optimal code rate for the MMSE receiver is generally higher than that for the MF, and increases with load and E _b/N _O. In the presence of fading, and with channel estimation, the optimal code rate approaches zero for both MMSE and MF receivers, but the MMSE filter is more robust with respect to a suboptimal choice of code rate.