Further Results on Optimum Selection Diversity for BPSK Signals in Nakagami-m Fading

This article develops a mathematical framework for analyzing the average bit error rate (ABER) performance of four different selection diversity combining (SDC) schemes over slow, frequency non-selective Nakagami-m fading channels. Aside from the traditional SDC, generalized selection combining (¿-GSC) and ´maximum matched filter output´ selection methods, two new selection rules based on choosing the branch providing the largest magnitude of log-likelihood ratio (LLR) for binary phase shift keying signals (with and without phase compensation in the selection process) are also investigated. The new framework is sufficiently general to examine the effects of dissimilar fading parameters and unequal mean received signal strengths across the diversity paths. The accuracies of our analytical expressions have been validated via Monte Carlo simulation.