Evaluation of antenna diversity performance for mobile handsets using 3-D measurement data

An evaluation of two-branch antenna diversity on mobile telephones is perfo rmed in the presence of head and hand phantoms to model the influence of th e user. Two mobile telephone prototypes for the 1800-MHz band are considere d. The evaluation is done by measuring the three-dimensional (3-D) complex radiation patterns from each antenna with the prototypes positioned near th e phantom head and hand (i.e., in talk position) and calculating the divers ity performance for three different scenarios of the incoming field. The tw o-branch antenna setups on both prototypes produce a calculated diversity g ain of about 9 dB for selection diversity at the 99% reliability level.