Methods and apparatus for performing finger de-spreading and MRC combining are provided. A large antenna buffer is used to buffer all the finger signals of the same user so that the receiver can do both de-spreading and MRC at the same time without buffering the de-spreading finger symbols. For each user, a reference time is introduced to align all the finger signals of the same user in the Antenna Buffer. The reference time delay is used to generate the PN codes for de-spreading, as well as to count the number of symbols in a PCG or a frame. Methods for antenna buffer arrangement, interpolating filter implementation, channel estimation and MRC for traffic data channels, timing for the user's finger signal de-spreading and MRC, long code and short code generation for de-spreading, new finger allocation and finger timing adjustment.