Postdetection selection diversity reception with correlated,unequal average power Rayleigh fading signals for π/4-shift QDPSKmobile radio

The diversity gain degradations due to fading correlation and unequal average power are investigated for practical, two-branch postdetection selection diversity reception. The average bit error rate (BER) of π/4-shift QDPSK is theoretically analyzed taking into account additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN), cochannel interference, and multipath channel delay spread; exact diversity gain degradations are calculated. Simple and useful approximate expressions for the gain degradations are also presented