A data communication system has a station that includes multiple antenna elements. The station communicates to the antenna elements by way of digital data channels. Each antenna is connected to an RF module that receives data by way of a corresponding digital data channel, encodes and transmits the data. Adaptive beamforming may be performed for interference mitigation. Embodiments use the strength of pilot signals and/or error vector magnitudes as cost functions for an adaptive beamforming alogorithm such as optimum combining. Unused sub-carriers may be applied to provide in-band communication to facilitate channel switching, data reallocation and other interference mitigation strategies.