In this paper we address the problem of efficient power allocation in the uplink of CDMA wireless networks, emphasizing on the support of real-time services' QoS prerequisites. The corresponding problem is formulated as a non-cooperative game where users aim selfishly at maximizing their utility-based performance under the imposed physical limitations. A user's utility reflects its degree of satisfaction with respect to its actual throughput performance, QoS requirements fulfillment, and the corresponding power consumption. The existence and uniqueness of a Nash equilibrium point of the proposed Uplink Power Control (UPC) game is proven, where all users have attained a targeted SINR value or transmit with their maximum power, leading essentially to an SINR-balanced network. The properties of equilibrium in a pure optimization theoretical framework are studied, and the tradeoffs between users' overall throughput performance and real-time services strict QoS requirements in channel aware resource allocation processes are revealed and quantified. Finally, a distributed iterative algorithm for computing UPC game's equilibrium is proposed and its efficiency is illustrated via simulation and analysis.
