1. A method for estimating characteristics of a channel, the method comprising: receiving a transmission of known reference data at a receiving device, wherein the reference data is transmitted over the channel that includes one or more desired layers and one or more interfering layers; and determining characteristics of the channel based on the known reference data, the determining including a joint estimation of the one or more desired layers and the one or more interfering layers, and the determining including selecting certain of the layers to be estimated at each of the known reference data, selecting certain of the layers to be estimated over a range of the known reference data, and solving an equation to jointly estimate the one or more desired layers and the one or more interfering layers based on the selections, the selections reducing a number of unknown values in the equation.