R99-3g UMTS (around 250-280kbps)

Rel 5- hsdpa (1.1 - 2 Mbps),

,rel 6Eul
HSPA+
rel8LTE
rel9wimax n lte interoperability,,
rel10Lte adv

rel7

W-cdmawide band bucz of 5mhz inspite of 1.25 of cdma(IS-95)

F-band -- UL 1920-1980

DL 2110-2170Mhz
Sensitivity level(depends on load and th service)
Main 3g services::
NodeB
UE
PG
pole capacity
CS12
speech with 12.2 kbps Dedi ch
-124dbm -119
25db
120.6 (UL),
64.1 (DL)
CS64 video with 64 dedi
-119dbm
Ps 64,128,384 pact switcin in dedi chnl
-115
-112
18db, 15,10db
12.8(DL)
HSDPA
high speed downlink pact access shared channel 2db (pg)
EUL Enhanced uplink

34.8 (UL),

UMTS Frame Structure ::

UMTS frame duration = 10ms.
Each frame is divided into 15 timeslots.
Each timeslot is divided into 2560 chips.
Therefore 2560 chips/TS * 15 TS/frame * (1000ms/10ms) frame/sec = 3,840,000
chip/sec.
Main idea of wcdma is to spread User signal over the whole band which pushes the signal to the
noise floor, so only receivers wid correct PN (pseudorandom noise)sequence can detect the
signal other receiver will see only the noise. Hence the security is high.
Narrow band interfrnce n multipath fading is also reduced.
Ec/No signifies the level difference between received pilot signal and the overall noise floor. No is
the noise floor, which contains all the useful as wel as interfering signals present at thereceiver
side.
For example: A value of Ec/No= -8 dB tells us that the spread signal is 8 dB below the noise floor
Higher the Ec/No value, the better it is.
Please note that the existing receivers have rake receiver functionality which enables them to
decode multiple pilots and use them accordingly based on their strength.
For example:
If there are 3 pilots present.the mobile receiver will compare Ec1/No, Ec2/No and Ec3/No and
decide which pilot will be the best server. More details are provided in Handover and Pilot
Pollution Sections.
RSCP : Received Signal Code Power is the received power on one code after despreading,
defined on the pilot symbols.
Ec/No = RSCP/RSSI
Whats Difference between RSCP,RSSI and EcNo?
December 28th, 2010Leave a commentGo to comments Views: 14075
Lots people have some confusion related to RSCP,RSSI and EcNo.
Here is the solution ::RSSI is Rx level before descrembling. Its just RxLev of UARFCH.
CPICH_RSCP is Rx level after descrembling.
CPICH_Ec/No is result of filtering after dechanalization.
In dBm is: RSCP=RSSI+EcNo

Spreading Code = Channelization Code; Scrambling codes ::

Why should we avoid pulsed transmission in the UL?

During the silent periods, only information for link maintenance purposes are needed in UL
direction.
To avoid audible interference to audio devices in UL, data and control channels are not time
multiplexed in WCDMA. Continuous transmission is achieved with I/Q code multiplexing or by
using parallel control and data channels.

Handover

::

What are the three sets in handover?

The 3 sets in handover are:
Active set the list of cells which are in soft handover with UE.
Monitored set the list of cells not in active set but RNC has told UE to monitor.
Detected set list of cells detected by the UE but not configured in the neighbor list.
What are the major differences between GSM and UMTS handover decision?
GSM:
Time-based mobile measures of RxLev and RxQual mobile sends measurement report
every SACH period (480ms).
BSC instructs mobile to handover based on these reports.
UMTS:
Event-triggered reporting UE sends a measurement report only on certain event
triggers.
UE plays more part in the handover decision.
What are the events 1a, 1b, 1c, etc.?
e
Set
e
e

1a a Primary CPICH enters the reporting range, i.e. addition of a new cell to the Active
1b a primary CPICH leaves the reporting range, i.e. deletion of a cell from the Active Set
1c a non-active primary CPICH becomes better than an active primary CPICH, i.e.
replacement of weaker cell in
Active Set
by another stronger cell (not in theActive Set)

 e
1d: change of best cell,, replacement of best cell in Active Set by a stronger cell (from
Active Set,Monitored Set
or Detected Set)
e 1e: a Primary CPICH becomes better than an absolute threshold.
e
1f: a Primary CPICH becomes worse than an absolute threshold.
What are event 2a-2d and 3a-3d?
Events 2a-2d are for inter-frequency handover measurements and events 3a-3d are for IRAT
handover measurements.
e
3a: the UMTS cell quality has moved below a threshold and a GSM cell quality had moved
above a threshold.
e
3b: the GSM cell quality has moved below a threshold.
e
3c: the GSM cell quality has moved above a threshold.
e
3d: there was a change in the order of best GSM cell list.
Soft & Softer Handover ::In this UE is connected to more than one NodeB at the same time. UE continuously measures the
neighbouring signals and compares the measurement results with thresholds set by the operator.
When the threshold is exceeded, UE sends a measurement report to the RNC. RNC decides if the
SHO should take place.
Soft Handover is also called MEHO Mobile Evaluated Handover
There are 3 types of Soft Handover
1) Handover between sectors in the same site (Softer Handover)
2) Intra-RNC SHO
3) Inter-RNC SHO
Majority of Soft handovers are usually Intra-RNC SHO
Advantages of SHO:
1) Seamless handover without disconnection of RAB
2) Better performance in areas where a single cell is not strong enough
Disadvantages of SHO
1) Increased consumption of radio resource as one UE in SHO, will use more than
one radio link at a time
Point to remember : SHO is kept in mind during the initial planning and ideally an
overhead of 30-40% is assumed.
Events
Mobile sends Measurement Report to RNC, when certain thresholds are crossed. For
SHO, it is important to know Event 1a, 1b, 1c and 1d.

3.10 Power Control

:-

Main purpose of Power control mechanism is to

1) maintain the quality of service
2) minimize the transmitted power in both UL and DL
In WCDMA, downlink power determines the interference and air interface capacity. So it is important to avoid excessive
transmission in DL. A single UE can create problems with excessive transmission in the UL. Power control mechanism
takes care of this.
Power control is done on both common and dedicated channels.
In common channels ensure that sufficient coverage is available to setup UE-originating and UE-terminating calls as
well as data transfer on RACH and FACH.
In dedicated channels ensure that connection quality is maintained in terms of BLER (Block Error Rate)
Open Loop Power Control When the UE accesses the system it first sends a preamble and waits for a response from
the NodeB. If this expected response, AI (Acquisition Indicator), is not obtained, the UE transmits another preamble with
slightly higher power.
The process of increasing preamble power continues till either a response is obtained from the NodeB or the allowed
number of preamble steps are used. When the maximum number of steps in a preamble cycle is used, another preamble
cycle is started, which in turn is limited by a maximum number of preamble cycles set by the operator.
Point to remember : Three parameters are controlled by the operator in the case of Open loop power control ( preamble
step, number of preamble steps in a preamble cycle and the number of preamble cycles).
Closed Loop Power Control (Fast Power Control) setting of TX power based on SIR target (in NodeB). Done with a
frequency of 1500Hz.
UE and BTS continuously compare the actual SIR of the received signal with a target SIR. Based on the comparison,
BTS/UE tells the UE/BTS to either increase or decrease the transmission power.

Outer Loop Power Control Basicaaly deals with setting of SIR target, which is based on Frame quality (in RNC).
Outer loop power control aims to provide the required quality in both UL and DL, by monitoring the BLER of the
received signal. Based on the BLER, the SIR target for the Fast Power Control is increased or decreased.
For example: if the received BLER is not meeting the expected quality, then the SIR target is increased and if the received
BLER is higher than the expected quality, then the SIR target is decreased.

What are the main issues in a real 3G network ??

Pilot Pollution (Improper Pilot Power Planning)
Main objective of Pilot planning is to have a dominant signal at a given place. Inpractice, this is difficult to
achieve. 2 to 3 strong signals are still ok, since Soft handover will manage the situation. But if you have
more signals coming at the same place with more-or-less equal strength, then the UE gets confused and
cannot correctly decode the signals due to low Useful Signal-to-Interference ratio (Ec/No) and hence the
call gets dropped.
Points to remember:
- Strive to have ONE dominant Pilot signal at a given place.
- In Ec/No, Ec is good (as long as there is no pilot pollution). No is interference.
Power, Tilt and Azimuths optimization mainly used to avoid pilot pollution.
Simply speaking, when the number of strong cells exceeds the active set size, there is pilot pollution in
the area. Typically the active set size is 3, so if there are more than 3 strong cells then there is pilot
pollution.
Definition of strong cell: pilots within the handover window size from the strongest cell. Typical handover
window size is between 4 to 6dB. For example, if there are more than 2 cells (besides the strongest cell)
within 4dB of the strongest cell then there is pilot pollution.
Missing Neighbour Definitions
This can be observed on Field with Tems or any monitoring tool (as Detected Set).
When the UE is getting a strong signal which is not defined as a neighbour to the existing cells in the
Active Set, the new signal adds to the interference. Soft handover does not take place and as a result
Ec/No degrades. As a result the call drops when the new signal is about 15dB higher than the cells in the
Active set.
Improper UEs
Though not observed on a wide scale, this can be a problem. A malfunctioning UE cancause many
problems like
- Demanding too much power from the base station
- In-efficient channel switching
- Excessive transmission of power in UL
-> IRAT HO Parameter Definition
- Improper definitions can lead to un-necessary handover between 3G and 2g. This can be a problem
especially for indoor customers using HSDPA or data services.
Overall throughput of the data user will be affected due to unnecessary handovers/cell changes.
Cell Breathing
With more and more users coming into a cell, the actual power available for services is lesser than the
power available in an empty cell. So the overall coverage of the cell shrinks.
Cell breathing is more of a planning issue and has to be considered at the planning stage itself. Proper
handover regions should be planned, to avoid any coverage gaps.
Prioritizing Neighbours
More efficient handover can be achieved by proper prioritization of neighbours. It is possible to give higher
priority for some cells than to other cells, so as to make sure that chances for a handover is higher
between certain cells. This parameter can also be used to avoid handover in certain locations between
certain cells to some extent. Improper allocation of priority can lead to bad handover decisions.
Low Sites
One major mistake RF planners did in the beginning was to install low sites for UMTS, thinking mistakenly
that since interference is to be avoided in UMTS, it is better to have low sites with lower coverage areas.
In actual practice, low sites are generally problematic as they overshoot and contribute to Pilot Pollution.
Down-tilting of low sites can lead to coverage holes(we should keep in mind that down-tilting is an
efficient way of reducing overshooting).

Basic parameter which we can changed as per requirement for betterment of KPI
1) CPICH TX Power
This is PCPICH transmitting power inside a cell. Set accordin 2 radio conditions, such as the cell coverage range (radius) and
geographical environment. In general, it is 10% of the total downlink transmitting power in the cell.(if nodeB 20W
i.e 46dbm then it should be 20W =43dbm
2) MaxFACHPower
This is max transmitting power of FACH, relative to CPICHTX Power. If the parameter is set too low, it will caused that the UE
will not receive the FACH packets, or the rate of the received wrong packets is very high; if too high, it will leads to the power
waste. It is enough that MaxFACHPower can ensure the target BLER.. If the accessed Ec/lo on the cell edge is -12dB, the
parameter can be set to -1dB, (relative to pilot).

3) Sintrasearch, Sintersearch and Ssearchrat

Sintrasearch -> start threshold for intra-frequency cell reselection Sintersearch-> start threshold for inter-frequency cell
reselection
Ssearchrat -> start threshold for inter-system cell reselection.
When UE checks the quality of the serving cell (that is
CPICH Ec/N0 measured by UE) is lower than the lowest quality standard (i.e. Qqualmin) of the serving cell plus the threshold. The
process of intra-frequency/inter-frequency/inter-system reselection is started. Sintrasearch has higher priority than that of
Sintersearch or Ssearchrat, so the value of Sintrasearch should be larger than that of Sintersearch or Ssearchrat. Sintrasearchis set to 5
(i.e.10dB) by default, Sintersearch to 4 (i.e. 8dB) by default ,and Ssearchratto 2 (i.e. 4dB) by default, which can be set according to
different conditions. For example, in an area with dense cells, Sintrasearch can be set to 7
.
4) Preamble Retrans Max
The parameter is the maximum times of an UE retransmitting preamble during a preamble escalating period. If the value is set too
low, the preamble power may not rise to the required value, so an UE cannot access successfully; if the value is too
high, the UE will increase the power continuously, and make access attempts repeatedly, which will cause interference to other user.
This parameter is set to 40 by default. If the connectivity is low, the default value can be increased.
5) Intra-FILTERCOEF
The parameter refers to the measuring smoothing factor adopted during the filtering of L3 intra-frequency measurement report. The
L3 filter should filter the random impact capability to enable that the filtered measured value can reflect the basic change trend of the
actual measurement. Because the measured value input the L3filter has passed the L1 filter that has almost removed the
fast fading influence, L3should smoothly filter the shadow fading and few fading burrs so as to provide the
Better measurement data for the event judgment. In light of the recommended protocol, the value range of the filter
coefficient is
{
0,1,2,3,4,5,6}. The larger the filter coefficient, the stronger the smoothing capability to burrs, but the weaker the tracing
capability to signals, so the two items must be balanced. The parameter is set to 5 by default, but it can be set according to
different conditions. For example, it can be set-to 2 in the area with dense cells.
6) Intra-CellIndividualOffset
The parameter refers to the offset of the CPICH measured value of the intra-frequency handover cell, which plus the actual
measured value is used for evaluating UE events. UE takes the original measured value plus the offset as the measurement result for
judging the UE intra-frequency handover, acting as the edge of the mobile cell in the handover algorithm. This parameter is set
according to the actual environment. If it is expected that the handover is easy to happen during the neighbor configuration, the
parameter can be set to a positive value, otherwise, it will be set to a negative value. It acts as the edge of the mobile cell in the
handover algorithm. The larger the parameter, the easier the soft handover and the more the UE in the soft handover state, but the
more forward resource occupied; the smaller the setting, the harder the soft handover, which may directly affect the receiving quality.
The parameter is set to 0 by default, that is to say, the influence caused by it can be ignored.
7) RLMaxDLPwr and RLMinDLPwr
(service-oriented) RLMaxDLPwr and RLMinDLPwr respectively means the maximum and minimum transmitting power of
downlink DPDCH symbol, represented by the relative value of CPICH. The range between the maximum and minimum power is
the dynamically adjusted range of power control, and can be set to 15dB.If RLMinDLPwr is set too low, it will cause that the
transmitting power is very low due to wrong SIR estimation; if it is set too high, it will influence the downlink
power control. From the standpoint of the capacity, RLMaxDLPwr can be set and adjust according to the target value of the
signal-interference rate actually required by the capacity design and the actual traffic statistic indicators if the full-coverage
service is not required

What is Admission Control?

Admission Control is an algorithm which controls the Resource Allocation for a new call and
additional resource allocation for an existing call. Incase, if a cell is heavily a loaded and enough
resources in terms of power, codes or CEs are not available, admission control denies permission
for the additional resource requirement.
What is Congestion Control?

Congestion Control monitors the dynamic utilization of specific cell resources and insures that overload
conditions do not occur. If overload conditions do occur, Congestion Control will immediately restrict
Admission Control from granting additional resources. In addition, Congestion Control will attempt to resolve
the congestion by either down switching, or terminating existing users. Once the congestion is corrected, the
congestion resolution actions will cease, and Admission Control will be enabled.

Analysis of various reports like RSRAN023 and 028 (Handover Performance),

RSRAN044 (IFHO Adjacencies), RSRAN045 (ISHO Adjacencies), RSRAN046 (SHO
Adjacencies), RSRAN067 (Cell Capacity), RSRAN087 (Iub_Capacity) etc to improve
network KPI performance.

Scrambling Codes ::
There are 512 scrambling codes in the downlink and 16,777,216 codes in the uplink.
There are 64 code groups, each group has 8 scrambling codes.
Can we assign same scrambling codes to sister sectors (sectors on same site)?
No, because scrambling code on the downlink is used for cell identity. As a requirement,
scrambling codes have to maintain a safe separation to avoid interference.

System Information Blocks (SIB) ::

Are System Information Blocks (SIB) transmitted all the time?
No, system information block is multiplexed with synchronization channel. Synchronization
channel occupies the first time slot (TS) and SIB occupies the other 9 time slots.

3G KPI and Troubleshooting ::What could be the cause of soft handover failure?
UE issue.
Resource unavailable at target NodeB.
Inadequate SHO threshold defined.
What may happen when theres a missing neighbor or an incorrect neighbor?

Access failure and handover failure: may attempt to access to a wrong scrambling code.
Dropped call: UE not aware of a strong scrambling code, strong interference.
Poor data throughput.
Poor voice quality

What is the typical event sequence of IRAT Handover from 3G to 2G

Event 2d entering into compressed mode measurement of 2G candidates Event 3a
Verification of 2G resources Handover from UTRAN Command from 3G RNC to UE
What are the possible causes for an IRAT Failure?
Missing 2G relations
Non availability of 2G Resources
Poor 2G Coverage
Missing 3G Relations
What are the possible causes for an Access Failure in UMts
Missing Neighbors
Poor Coverage
Pilot Pollution / Spillover
Poor Cell Reselection
Core Network Issues
Non availability of resources. Admission Control denies
Hardware Issues
Improper RACH Parameters
External Interference
What are the possible causes for an Access failure in UMts

Missing Neighbors
Poor Coverage
Pilot Pollution / Spillover
Poor Cell Reselection
Core Network Issues
Non availability of resources. Admission Control denies
Hardware Issues
Improper RACH Parameters
External Interference

B
Call Setup Failure Analysis-Block B The purpose of this activity is to check the Random Access Process is working adequately by
investigating whether AI (Acquisition Indicator) has been received through DL AICH ,,If AICH was
not received by UE, the cause of the problem can be classified into:
Inadequate RAN parameter related to Random Access: RAN parameter settings for pre-amble
transmission or open loop power control information is not correct.
UL Coverage limit: UL coverage of UE is smaller compared to serving cells DL coverage so that
UEs Tx power cannot reach serving cell.

RRC Connection Rejectafter RRC Connection Request

Good RF conditions
Admission Control can reject too many (or admit too many) connection requests due to wrong
PrxNoise measurements.
PrxNoise statistics, receive link parameters and HW units to be checked

What are the possible causes for a

Poor Coverage (DL / UL)
Pilot Pollution / Pilot Spillover

Drop Call

on a UMTS network?

Missing Neighbor
SC Collisions
Delayed Handovers
No resource availability (Congestion) for Hand in
Loss of Synchronization
Fast Fading
Delayed IRAT Triggers
Hardware Issues
External Interference

Alarm Examples Related to Access Transmission ::

7651 BASE STATION OPERATION DEGRADED, WSC oven oscillator fault
The oven oscillator adjusting area has reached its limit value.
7652 BASE STATION NOTIFICATION, Step change of oven oscillator control more than 10% of
maximum control range
The DAC word has changed more than 204 steps.If the ratio between the reference
frequency from Iub and the reference oscillator frequency of theBTS is too large, this alarm is
generated. The reference clock from Iub or WSC/WMC can be unstable.
7651 BASE STATION OPERATION DEGRADED, Transmission clock missing
Calculating the DAC word is stopped when the fault is active.If a cancel arrives, tuning is restarted.The Base Station can function properly for some time when calculating the DAC word
is stopped.
7651 BASE STATION OPERATION DEGRADED,Fault in O&M and DSP SW interface
SFN synchronization is lost. Illegal SFN value in downlink. The WSP does not receive frame
number from the Wideband Application Manager Unit (WAM), or the frame number is faulty.
7651 BASE STATION OPERATION DEGRADED, ATM overflow
Unable to allocate AAL2 resources. The reason for this could be lack of transmission
capacity.

4. HSDPA
HSDPA has a fixed spreading factor of 16. Multiple codes can be reserved for HSDPA at this
SF level and depending on the number of codes available, the speed varies. Details are given
in the section What is the maximum possible speed in HSDPA?

Generally operators reserve 5 or 10 codes per carrier (out of the 15 available) for HSDPA
service, which implies that these codes are not available for other R99 services like Speech,
CS64 and PS. There are different ways of code allocation for HSDPA, and this varies from
vendor to vendor.
When there is a shortage of codes, due to higher traffic, the operators can go for a second
carrier. Operator can decide how to distribute HS and R99 traffic in different carriers. It is
also possible to have a carrier fully allocated to HS, which implies that 15 codes will be
available solely for HS and no other services will be possible in that carrier.
Point to remember: Greater the number of codes you reserve for HS, lesser the resources
available for R99 services.

HSDPA Techniques
-

Shared Channel Transmission (enabling one user to have more than one code)
Shorter TTI (2ms)
Higher Modulation Technique (16QAM )
Hybrid ARQ Retransmission
Faster Scheduling based on Radio conditions
Better Scheduling Techniques(code rate, modulation technique)

Time and code multiplexing of the users

Multi-Code transmission
Fixed Spreading Factor (SF = 16)
Shorter TTI = 2ms
No DTX (Discontinuous transmission)for the data channel
Adaptive modulation and coding (AMC) supporting higher order modulation
Node B scheduling and link adaptation
Node B retransmissions (H-ARQ Hybrid Auotmatic Repeat-Request)
No power control
No soft handover

HSDPA Channel Structure

In addition to the new downlink shared channel HS-DSCH, some control channels are
also required for HSDPA. Mainly they are HS-SCCH and HS-DPCCH.

Advantages of HSDPA over R99

Faster Retransmission (due to control in NodeB), leading to much lower RTT

As seen in the picture above, in case of R99, retransmission decision is taken in the RNC (RLC
layer), whereas in HSDPA, the retransmission decision is taken in NodeB (MAChs layer). This
leads to a great reduction in overall RTT (Round Trip Time).
- More codes used by a single user, hence higher throughputs.
- Shorter TTIs, hence better response time and RTT
- 16QAM is not used in R99.
- Soft Combining of re-transmission
Point to remember : There are mainly 2 types of scheduling in HSDPA Round Robin and
Proportional Fair. Round Robin scheduling, allocates resources to every user in a round robin
manner regardless of the radio conditions, the users are in.
Proportional fair scheduling takes into account, the radio conditions also and tries to improve the
overall cell throughput by giving slightly higher preference to users in better radio conditions.

In actual testing conditions, not much difference in overall cell throughput was observed between
the two scheduling techniques and since Round Robin scheduling came free of charge, with most
vendors, it was the preferred scheduler
HSDPA Counters for Ericsson system.
pmAverageUserRate:the distribution of the average user rate among all user allocated ti highspeed-DSCH in the cell.
pmTargetHsRate:the target high-speed bit rate as a percentage of the maxHsRate parameter.
pmNoOfHsUsersPerTti:Average number of high speed users scheduled in the cell at each 2 ms
TT1
pmRbsHsPdschCodePrio:The number of times there is an Hs-PDSCH HW shortage. The counter
accumulates the number of code shortage occurrences, that is, the number of time priority
resolve is entered in the algorithm for dynamic code allocation.
pmRemainingResourceCheck:the reason why it is not possible to schedule another highspeed user for immediate traffic. (1) Hs-SCCH code shortage; (2) HS-PDSCH code shortage;(3)HSPDSCH power shortage.
pmSampleNumHspdschCodesAdded:the number of times the RBS dynamic code addition
algorithm is executed.
pmSumNumHspdschCodesAdded:sum of all codes that are allocated for HS-DSCH (RNC
allocation codes allocated by the RBS dynamic HS-PDSCH code addition algorithm)
What is benefit of shorter TTI in HSDPA?
1)After every TTI the resources can be redistributed among the users. Therefore, the resource
usage is more efficient.
2)each UE reports about the channel quality after every TTI by sending the CQI.
3)CQI is sent after the very short period of time of 2 ms, it is possible to effectively perform link
adaptation even in rapidly changing conditions.