Performance Analysis of V-BLAST System with Imperfect Channel Estimation

In this paper, the impact of Gaussian estimation error on the performance of Vertical Bell Labs Layered Space-Time (V-BLAST) architecture using maximum likelihood (ML) receiver in independently and identically distributed (i.i.d.) Rayleigh fading channel is investigated. Based on the statistical property of squared Euclidean distance, the pairwise error probability (PEP) for V-BLAST system over i.i.d Rayleigh fading channel with channel estimate error is derived. The approximate expression of the PEP for high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) region is used to analyze the loss of diversity order and penalty of SNR. It shows that the diversity order achieved by ML receiver is not affected by channel estimation error and the loss of SNR due to imperfect channel estimation is 3 dB. Simulation results are given to corroborate the theoretical analysis