A General Approach Analysis for Amplify-and-Forward Relaying in Cooperative Diversity Networks

A general approach for analyzing the performance of dual-hop cooperative diversity networks with nonregenerative amplify-and-forward (AF) relays and employing maximal-ratio combining (MRC) at the destination is proposed. Either variable or fixed gain relaying systems can be investigated from our methodology. Closed-form approximations for the outage pro- bability (OP) and average symbol error rate (SER) of linear modulations are proposed. Our formulations are simple and yield results instantaneously, regardless the number of relays used, in contrast to the exact solution which is rather intricate and difficult to evaluate especially when the number of relays increases. The inherent simplicity of our method makes it attractive to serve as a benchmark in the design and performance evaluation of cooperative networks with variable-gain/fixed-gain relays and employing MRC. The accuracy of our approximations is illustrated through Monte Carlo simulation and insightful discussions are provided.