A wireless communications device may include a path searcher for detecting signal peak locations in a received spread-spectrum signal, and a RAKE finger stage. The RAKE finger stage may include a plurality of RAKE fingers for determining symbol values from the received spread-spectrum signal based upon the detected peak locations. Each RAKE finger may include at least one de-spreader for de-spreading time-staggered versions of the received spread-spectrum signal and operating at a signal rate of the received spread-spectrum signal, and a frequency corrector downstream from the at least one de-spreader comprising a phase lock loop (PLL) operating at a rate that is less than the signal rate.