IMPACT-2009
A Simple Modified Fixed Step Size Power
Control Algorithm for CDMA Cellular Systems
M.A. Rahim Khan, Dr. P. C. Jain*
School of Electronics,
C-DAC, B-30, Sector-62, Noida-201307 (UP)
*pcjain@cdacnoida.in
ABSTRACT--CDMA is interference limited multiple access system.
Power control is an effective way to reduce co-channel
interference. Consequently, it can improve the system capacity.
CDMA employs fast closed-loop power control in uplink in which
signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) is estimated. Transmitting
power is adjusted by comparing estimated SIR with desired SIR.
In this paper a modified fixed step power control algorithm has
been proposed, which can improve the performance of a CDMA
system. The proposed algorithm produced a faster convergence
and low outage probability compared to other power control
algorithms discussed and analyzed to maintain the desired SIR
target.
I. INTRODUCTION
IF the growth of the personal communication industry is to
continue as it has for the past decade, methods need to be
devised to allow increasing number of customers to share the
available communication bandwidth. In order to achieve high
capacity cellular communication system, efficient spectrum
usage is of paramount importance. Different methods have
been developed to achieve efficient spectrum. In frequency
division multiple access (FDMA) the total bandwidth of the
system is divided in to narrow frequency channels using band-
pass filters. These channels are then allocated to the users.
Many first generation cellular system solved problem by using
FDMA technology. Along with the change from analog to
digital, time division multiple access (TDMA) was
implemented digitally in second-generation cellular systems.
In TDMA each frequency channel is divided into time slots
that are allocated to users. An alternative multiple access
CDMA competitor to TDMA emerged in later second
generation cellular system. The Code Division Multiple
Access (CDMA) is a spread spectrum technology in which
each user is assigned a pseudo-random spreading code. Using
this code, the narrow band data signal of the user is spread
over large bandwidth. All users transmit on the same
frequency at the same time but with different spreading code.
CDMA offers high capacity in comparison of TDMA and
FDMA since CDMA is independent of frequency and time
slots among users. Spreading code identifies the users in the
receiver by correlating the received signal with replica of the
desired user’s code. The cross-correlation of different
spreading codes is ideally zero but due to multi-path
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propagation and other interferences it is hard to keep up
orthogonality of code when large number of users are present
in a cell. The receiver, therefore, sees the other user’s signals
as interference (co-channel interference) and more users in the
system will generate more interference. Thus co-channel
interference is dominating factor in CDMA system. This limits
the capacity of the CDMA system. To increase the capacity,
some methods are needed for interference management.
II. POWER CONTROL
Power control aims to control the transmission power in such a
way that the co-channel interference is minimized while
achieving sufficient Quality of Service (QoS). Co-channel
interference is minimized if minimum possible transmission
powers are used. Minimizing the transmission powers prolongs
the battery life of the mobile station (MS). Power control in
CDMA is a closed loop power control (Distributed power
control), which is a combination of outer and inner closed loop
power control. It adjusts the transmitted power in order to keep
the required Signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) equal to a given
desired SIR-target. SIR is a measure of the quality of the
received signal and used to determine the control action that
needs to be taken. The SIR-target is fixed according to the
received Bit Error Rate (BER). The setting of the SIR-target is
done by the outer loop power control in order to match the
required BER. Outer loop power control update rate is 10 to
100 times per sec. The inner closed loop measures the SIR at
MS and sends command to the Base Station (BS) for transmit
power update. The transmitted power has a fixed value during
given time slot. The update rates are 800 times per sec for
CDMA (IS-95) and 1500 times per sec for Wideband-CDMA.
If SIR-measured is greater than SIR-target then command is
sent to decrease the transmit power and if less than, then
command is sent to increase the transmit power. No-change
command is provided when the SIR-measured is reasonably
closer to the SIR-target thus reducing the ping-pong effect
around the target. One bit is enough to inform the BS to either
increase or decrease its transmitted power by a fixed amount
typically by 1 dB. Many power control algorithms are
proposed in literature and are studied and compared in this
paper.
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 IMPACT-2009
Near-far problem in CDMA occurs in the absence of power
control. If all mobile users are transmitted at the same power
level, the mobile closest to the BS will overpower all others
since signal drops exponentially with the distance. The power
control aims to set the transmitted power of mobile stations so
that signals are received at the same mean power level at BS.
The uplink power control is critical for the capacity of CDMA
system. The requirement of the dynamic range of uplink power
control can be of the order of 80dB. In down link since all
signals transmitted by BS, propagate through same radio
channel before reaching to MS. They undergo the same
attenuation and so power control is not needed. Power control
is used to provide more power to mobile users located near
border of the cell, suffering from high interference due to
nearby mobile users from other cells and hence sufficient
power is required from BS to minimize the interference
produced by nearby cells. The dynamic range of downlink
power control is usually smaller than in uplink (typically 20-30
dB)
Human voice activity cycle is 35%. When mobile user
assigned to the channel is not talking then all other channels
are benefited with less interference in a CDMA radio channel
and thus mutual interference reduces by 65%. With this the
channel capacity increases three times. This advantage is only
with CDMA and not with FDMA and TDMA where the
frequency channel or time slot is dedicated to the user
respectively and the channel capacity is wasted during silent
period.
III. CLOSED LOOP POWER CONTROL
Closed loop power control manages problem above by
constantly controlling the received power of the mobiles and
continuously adjust its transmit power in order to achieve some
predetermined threshold level of SIR. The closed loop power
control is used with the objective to keep the SIR measured as
close as possible to SIR-target. This can be achieved using
Pn+1 = Pn + sgn (yt – yn).</ (1)
Where Pn is current power at iteration n, yt is SIR-target, </ is
step size, and yn is current measured SIR represented as
Yn = (Gki.Pi)/[ Σ Qj≠i Gkj.Pj + ni] (2)
Where Pi and Pj are transmitted power of mobile i and j
respectively, Gki and Gkj are link gain from base station k to
mobile i and j respectively and ni is receiver noise of mobile i
All mobile users measure SIR and then subtract from yt SIR-
target with sign function. This creates transmit power control
(TPC) command which is then send to the BS. The transmit
power at BS is adjusted according to the TPC received from
mobile user. Thus closed loop power control is able to adjust
the power levels of each transmitted signal using only local
measurements carried at MS. With this all mobile users will
maintain the desired SIR in reasonable time. The power
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control step size is a parameter of the fast (inner) closed loop
power control. The power update step size may be chosen
according to the average mobile speed and other operating
environment parameters.
Pilot signals are transmitted at a constant power from BS to
MS. The variation of its strength gives information of the
downlink attenuation. This is called open-loop power control
(Centralized power control). The center frequency allocated to
up- and downlink transmissions are usually widely separated
and thus the correlation between up- and downlink attenuation
is generally weak. Centralized power control requires
extensive computational power due to number of mobile users
in network. However, closed loop power control (Distributed
power control) adjusts power levels of each transmitted signal
using local measurements in reasonable time to maintain SIR
for all users.
In this paper, we propose a modified fixed step size power
control algorithm and compared with performance with six
existing algorithms using MATLAB simulations. Our
algorithm achieves better performance in terms of faster
convergence and fewer oscillations at low outage probabilities.
This section discusses six different distributed power control
algorithms while section IV provides simulations results to
compare their performances. Finally section V concludes with
extension of modified fixed step size power control to multiple
cell scenarios.
A. Distance Based Power Control
Distance Based Power Control (DBPC) algorithm uses the
distance between base station (BS) and each mobile station
(MS) to allocate transmitted power to each of its served
mobiles [11]. No feedback is provided and hence it is called
open-loop power control mechanism. If power control is not
applied (i.e. transmit power is same for all users), the most
constrained value of signal-to-interference ratio (SIR) will be
for a user at the boundary of the cell. Thus more transmit
power is allocated to mobiles that have poor channel
conditions as per the equation
Gk = Ak/Rd (3)
Where Gk is link gain, Ak is constant depends on antenna
properties, transmission wavelength, and environment. R is the
distance between BS and MS in meters and d is path loss
exponent with value of 2 for free space propagation and 5 for
dense urban areas. Mobiles closer to BS under distance Rmin
are allocated same transmission power.
B. Distributed Balancing Power Control
Distributed Balancing power control (DB) algorithm uses the
received SIR at the MS to adjust the transmitted power of the
BS in order to achieve better global transmission quality (QoS)
 IMPACT-2009
for the entire call [6]. The algorithm calculates the optimal
transmit power assignment for mobile, which is proportional to
the ratio of total received power of the mobile to the link gain
between its BS and itself. Power allocation for each MS is
calculated at the BS in a centralized manner (typically every
1.25ms or 800 times per sec). Then each mobile measure the
SIR and the link gain between its home BS and itself at the
beginning of every control period, and transmits the SIR to its
BS. BS updates its transmit power to each mobile based on the
received SIR from each mobile user. This affects the received
power at each mobile, and corresponding SIR.
C. Multiple Fixed Step size Power Control
Multiple Fixed Step size Power Control (MSPC) algorithm is a
closed loop power control algorithm in which feedback from
the mobile user is used to adjust the transmit power of the BS
[6]. The update is based on the average SIR at the mobile, and
the adjustments usually occur in multiple step size. The MS
measures the SIR over a time period (1.25ms) and compare
with a predefined SIR-target. If the measured SIR is larger
than SIR-target, then mobile user sends a power down
command to the BS, otherwise, it sends a power up command.
The BS interprets the commands transmitted from mobile user
and updates transmitted power accordingly. The power update
takes place in multiple fixed step size instead of single fixed
step.
D. Adaptive Step size Power control
Adaptive Step size Power Control (ASPC) algorithm uses
adaptive step size as opposed to fixed step size in order to
achieve faster convergence towards SIR-target [3]. Here the
first power update command is interpreted as a fixed step size
</. However, we adapt step size dynamically if successive
feedback commands requests additional change in the power
level in the same direction to ensure faster convergence. The
power control updates take place in multiple steps of different
sizes (u</ in case of successive up command and v</ in case of
successive down command where u and v are increasing and
decreasing factor respectively).
Analysis of above algorithms showed that DBPC and DB
algorithms are non-iterative since power assignments are
decided on the basis of the initial SIR values. Thus, outage
percentage increases as number of mobile users increases in a
cell due to co-channel interference. Outage percentage is a
probability of failing to achieve adequate reception of the
signal due to co-channel interference. Further the performance
of DBPC is worse than DB since it uses individual distance of
the mobile from BS as metric for power allocation. MSPC uses
feedback mechanism, percentage of outage decreases with the
number of iterations. However, MSPC uses fixed step size,
outage percentage falls off at a slower rate. Fast convergence is
achieved by either making the iteration time-step smaller, or
by designing iteration with faster convergence property. ASPC
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results in faster reduction of the outage percentage. However,
oscillations are there because of choosing single SIR-target.
E. Constrained Second Order Power Control
Constrained Second Order Power Control (CSOPC) algorithm
updates transmission power using current and past power with
weight ω(n) to determine the necessary transmission power of
each mobile [9]. This algorithm reduces the instruction sets for
faster convergence. The second order iterative expression is
represented as
Pi(n+1)=min[Pi,max,{0,ω(n)(yt/Si (n))Pi (n)
+(1-ω(n))Pi (n-1)}] (4)
Where ω(n) is a decreasing sequence such that limω(n) Æ= 1,
ω(n)=1+ (1/1.5)n for n=1, 2, 3…l, where l is total number of
iterations, Pi max is maximum allowable power for mobile i.
F. Linear Quadratic Power Control
Applying modern control theory to CDMA power control, a
state space equation for a CDMA power control system and
liner quadratic power control (LQPC) have been developed [8]
and expressed for mobile i as
S i (n+1) = {GkiPi (n) +ui (n)}/Ii (n) =si(n) + vi (n);
n=1,2,….l (5)
Where Ii (n)=Σ Qj≠i PjGkj+ ni and vi(n)=ui(n)/ Ii(n) depends on
total interference produced by the other users and the noise in
the system. The iterative expression can be represented as
Pi(n+1)=min{Pi,max, Si (n+1)Ii(n)} (6)
G. Modified Fixed Step size Power Control
In ASPC outage probability has faster convergence rate but
there is significant instability or oscillations in outage
percentage. It is due to choosing single SIR-target. As a result,
the mobile toggled between two regions whenever measured
SIR is near SIR-target. To mitigate this effect, a buffer region
with lower critical threshold and upper critical threshold is
chosen for SIR-target in modified fixed step size power control
algorithm. This increases the stability due to the buffer, which
provides a memory based damping effect similar to hysteresis.
In this case if the measured SIR is between lower and upper
critical SIR-target values, the mobile does not send any control
feedback to the BS. Thus we eliminate the oscillation observed
at low outage percentages in adaptive step size power control
algorithm. The MS measures the SIR over a time period
(1.25ms) and compare with a predefined SIR-target. If the
measured SIR is larger than SIR-target, then mobile user sends
a power down command to the BS, otherwise, it sends a power
up command. The BS interprets the commands transmitted
from mobile user and updates transmitted power accordingly.
The power update takes place according to the amount of
 IMPACT-2009

difference between measured SIR and SIR-target instead of
single fixed step.
IV. SIMULATIONS AND RESULTS
The simulation of fixed step power control and modified fixed
step power control algorithms were performed based on an IS-
95 CDMA system in a single cell. Fifty mobiles were
randomly allocated in a cell. All mobiles are listening at all
times. In this study we consider only lognormal shadow
fading, hence link gain Gki is lognormal distributed with mean
0dB and standard deviation 6dB. Same SIR-target was applied
to all mobile in a cell, and varied between 6 to 8 dB as a
function of simulation steps. Following parameters have been
taken for simulation: Bit rate 9600bits/s, Radio channel BW
1.2288MChips/s, Receiver noise 10-12 for all mobiles,
Maximum transmission power of each mobile 1W. Initial
power of each mobile was generated uniformly between 1mW
to 1W.
Outage percentage is a probability of failing to achieve
adequate reception of the signal due to co-channel interference.
Table shows outage percentage for 50 mobiles, number of
iterations required to reduce the outage percentage to zero, and
number of iterations required to maintain SIR-target within 6-
8dB for different closed loop power control algorithms.
Results shows that the outage percentage needed is least in M-
FSPC and number of iterations required also less both to
reduce outage percentage to zero and to maintain SIR-target
within 6-8dB.
V. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper we have presented an overview of various power
control algorithms for CDMA system. We have simulated
fixed step power control and modified fixed step power control
algorithms and compared with the existing algorithms. The
results indicate that proposed algorithm improves the
performance of closed loop power control compared to
existing algorithms. The outage percentage for 50 mobiles
needs minimum iterations and SIR is also maintained within
SIR-target in minimum number of iterations compared to all
algorithms explained above. The modified fixed step power
control algorithm can handle large number of mobile users in a
CDMA system.
Future work can include the performance measure with
mobility of mobile stations moving within the cell and when
MS moves from one BS to another (hand-off control) in multi-
cell scenario.
thankful to Dr. P.R. Gupta, Head, School of IT and Mr.
Munish Kumar, Head, M.Tech. IT Program for providing
facilities to work in the above project.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The authors are grateful to Dr.George Varkey, Executive

Director, C-DAC, Noida for his encouragement and
permission to present/publish this paper. Mr. Rahim khan is

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