UMTS Key Technologies

ZTE University
Crucial Factors for UMTS Network (CQC)

Capacity

All the key technologies adopted are used to try to

achieve the optimal balance of the three factors
Coverage and Capacity
 UMTS performance is determined by such factors
as：
 Number of users
 Transmission rate
 Moving speed
 Wireless environment
 indoors
 Outdoors
 The radius of cell depends on such factors as:
 Local radio conditions (local interference)
 Traffic in neighbouring cells (remote interference)
 Cell Radius decrease according to the Increase of
user number
Factors affects UMTS Capacity
Factors Impact on UMTS capacity
RAKE The advanced receiving and baseband processing
Receiver technology is introduced to overcome the fast fading
Power Control Reducing interference, saving power and Increasing capacity
Handover Impacting the capacity through applying different proportion
Control and algorithm of soft handover
Admission Admitting a connection base on the load and the admission
Control threshold of planned capacity
Monitoring system load and adjusting the ongoing services to
Load Control
avoid overload
The Allocation of codes impacts the maximum number of
OVSF Code
simultaneous connections.
Wireless Wireless environment such as interferences, UE position and
Environment mobility etc. can influent the cell capacity
Coverage/capacity VS Data Rate
 Higher data rate needs higher power
 High data rate transmission is only available nearby the
station

Coverage decrease >384 kbps

>144 kbps
>64 kbps

Subscriber
num >12.2 kbps
increase
Optimization methods
 To overcome Cell Breathing Effect caused by increased
traffic and meet different requirements for capacity and
coverage in different environment, following solutions can
be applied:

DL  DL/UL:
 transmission diversity (Tx Div)  Add carrier
 high power amplifier  six sectors

UL
 Tower Mounted Amplifier (TMA) Add basestation
 4 Rx Div “last choice”
 OTSR
Content

 RAKE Receiver
 Handover Control
 Compressed Mode
 Admission Control
 Load Control
 Code Resource Allocation
Multi-path characteristics of radio channel
 Electromagnetic propagation:
 direct radiation、reflection、diffraction and scattering
 Signal attenuation:
 Path loss： Loss of electromagnetic waves in large scope of the
spread reflects the trend of the received signal in the spreading。
 Slow fading：Loss because of being blocked by the building and
hill in the propagation path
 Fast fading：Electromagnetic signals rapidly decline in a few
dozens wavelength ranges
 Description of Fast fading distribution
 Rayleigh distribution：non line-of –sight(NLOS) transmission
 Rician distribution：line-of –sight(LOS) transmission
Multi-Path Effects

sending signal

strength

receiving signal

0 time
RAKE Receiver
 The multi-path signals contain some useful energy ,
therefore the UMTS receiver can combine these energy of
multi-path signals to improve the received signal to noise
ratio.
 RAKE receiver adopts several correlation detectors to
receive the multi-path signals, and then combines the
received signal energy.

RAKE Receiver can effectively overcome the multi-path

interference, consequently improve the receiving performance.
RAKE Receiving

d1
d2

d3

transmitting Receiving
Rake
combination
noise

t t t
RAKE Receiving
Single
receiving

Single
receiving combining signal
receiver
Single
receiving

searcher calculate

s(t) s(t)

t t

RAKE Receiving overcomes multi-finger interference, improves

receiving performance
Content

 RAKE Receiver
 Handover Control
 Compressed Mode
 Admission Control
 Load Control
 Code Resource Allocation
What’s ？

 When UE is moving from the coverage area of

one site to another, or the quality of service is
declined by external interference during a service,
the service must be handed over to an idle
channel for sustaining the service.
 Handover is used to guarantee the continuity of
service.
 Handover is a key technology for mobile
networking.
 Category of Handover
UMTS system support
multiple handover technology
Soft handover (SHO)
 Intra-RNC, inter-Node B
 Inter-RNC
Softer handover
 Same Node B, Inter-sector
Hard handover (HHO)
 Intra-frequency
 Inter-frequency
 Inter-system (UMTS&GSM)
 Inter-mode (FDD&TDD)
Handover Demonstration

Hard
Handover

Soft
Handover
Soft Handover/Softer Handover

Soft Handover
C C

A A

B B
Soft-Softer Handover
C C

A A

B B

Softer Handover
C C

A A

B B
Hard Handover

 During the hard handover procedure, Hard Handover

all the old radio links with the UE are
abandoned before new ones are CN
established, so there must be
service interruption during the HHO. SRNC
RNC or
BSC

 Hard handover may occur in the

following main cases Node B or
Node B
BTS
 When the UE is handed over to another
UTRAN carrier, or another technology
mode.
 When soft handover is not permitted (if
O&M constraint)
Soft/Softer Handover
 The soft/softer handover allows to migrate from one cell to
another without service interruption or without deleting all
old radio links.
 UE can connecte to more than one cell simultaneously and
take benefit from the macro-diversity.

Soft
SoftHandover
Soft Handover
Handover Softer
Softer
Softer Handover
Handover
Handover
The two Node Bs Node
The two may Bs CN CN
CN
CN CN
belong to the
may Same
belong RNC
to the
same RNC
SRNC DRNC SRNC
Iur
Node B Node B
UMTS General Handover Trilogy

 Measurement Control
 UTRAN demands the UE to start measurement through
issuing a measurement control message.
 Handover decision
 UTRAN makes the decision based on the measurement
reports from UE. The implementation of handover
decision is various for different vendors. It impacts on
the system performance critically.
 Handover execution
 UTRAN and UE execute different handover procedure
according to the handover command.
Handover Flows
(A) RNC sends measurement
control message to UE
(Measurement Control) Current (E) Quality Other
carrier has system has
Decision
good quality good
(B) UE starts measurement task quality
with the parameters included in Other carrier has good
the message, and reports quality
measurement results（
Measurement Report）

(F) maintain the (G) Allocate resource (H) Allocate

(C) RNC stores the active set and in target cell, prepare resource in target
measurement results according monitored set to execute handover cell, prepare to
to frequencies and cells execute handover

(D) RNC Estimates the quality

of each carrier (including intra-
（I）If handover is required, RNC sends
frequency and inter-frequency)
handover command with target cell to UE
General Procedure of Handover Control (I)
 Measuring
 The measurement objects are decided by RNC. Usually,
either Ec/Io or RSCP (Received Signal Code Power) of P-
CPICH channel is used for handover decision.
 ZTE RNC adopts Ec/Io measurement, because Ec/Io
embodies both the received signal strength and the
interference. The relation of Ec/Io and RSCP is shown as
follows:
 Ec/Io ＝RSCP/RSSI
 In the above equation，RSSI（Received Signal Strength
Indicator）is measured within the bandwidth of associated
channels
General Procedure of Handover Control (II)
 Filtering
 The measurement results should be filtered before being
reported. Measurement filtering can be regarded as a low pass
filtering procedure. The following equation is applied for filtering.
 Fn=(1-a)Fn-1＋a*Mn
 Variants definition：
 Fn：filtered measurement result；
 Fn-1：last filtered measurement result；
 Mn：latest Ec/Io or RSCP measurement result received from
physical layer;
 a = 1/2(k/2), k means the “Filter coefficient”, which is included in the
Measurement Control message. It is decided by the UTRAN.
 F0 is initialized by the first measurement result M1.
General Procedure of Handover Control (III)

 Reporting
 Period report triggered handover
 Base on the filtered measurement result
 Event report triggered handover
 Base on the event
Measurement result filtered in UE
Soft Period Event decided in RNC
Handover Handover decided in RNC

Hard Measurement result filtered in UE

Handover Event decided in UE
Event
Handover decided in RNC
General Procedure of Handover Control (IV)

 Handover algorithm
 All the handover algorithms including soft handover,
hard handover and so on are implemented on the event
decision made according to the measurement reports.
 Events defined in 3GPP specifications
 Intra-frequency events：1A~1F
 Inter-frequency events：2A~2F
 Inter-RAT events：3A~3D
 Note: RAT is short for “Radio Access Technology”, e.g.
UMTS&GSM
Concepts Related to Handover

 Active Set:
 A set of cells that have established radio links with a
certain mobile station.
 User information is sent from all these cells.
 Monitored Set:
 A set of cells that are not in the active set but are
monitored according to the list of adjacent cells
assigned by the UTRAN.
 Detected Set:
 A set of cells that are neither in the active set nor in the
monitor set.
Soft handover event

Event Description

Quality of target cell improves, entering a

1A
report range of relatively activating set quality

Quality of target cell decreases, depart from a

1B
report range of relatively activating set quality

The quality of a non-activated set cell is better

1C
than that of a certain activated set cell

1D Best cell generates change

Quality of target cell improves, better than an
1E
absolute threshold
Quality of target cell decreases, worse than
1F
an absolute threshold
An Example of SHO Procedure
Pilot
⊿t ⊿t ⊿t
Ec/Io

Pilot Ec/Io of cell 1

Pilot Ec/Io of cell 2

Pilot Ec/Io of cell 3 time

Connect to cell1 Event 1A Event 1C Event 1B

（add cell2）（replace cell1 with cell 3）（remove cell3）
RNS Relocation

Core Network Core Network

Iu Iu
Serving Iur Target Serviing Target
RNS RNS RNS RNS

RNS
Radio Network Sub-system

 RNS relocation can :

 Reduce the Iur traffic significantly
 Enhance the system adaptability
Hard Handover
 Hard handover measurement is much more complex for
UE than soft handover measurement.
 Inter-frequency hard handover requires UE to measure the
signal of other frequencies.
 UMTS employs compressed mode technology to support
inter-frequency measurement.
Content

 RAKE Receiver
 Handover Control
 Compressed Mode
 Admission Control
 Load Control
 Code Resource Allocation
Purpose of Compressed Mode

 In order to support inter-frequency and inter-RAT

handover, UE is required to perform inter-frequency
and Inter-RAT measurement periodically.
 The UE with one transceiver does not have the
opportunity to perform inter-frequency measurement
during the service period (especially the voice call) ,
because the transceiver is busy in transmitting and
receiving the signals all the time.
 Compressed mode can provide idle slot based
transmission time window, which can be used for
inter-frequency measurement, for the UEs in
connected state, e.g. CELL_DCH.
Compressed Mode

10ms

1 frame（10ms） Transmit gaps（Maximum 7 slots = 4.7ms）

Compressed Mode Transmission Diagram

Generation of Compressed Mode Frame

 Puncturing
 Lower the symbol rate of physical channel when
processing the rate matching procedure
 SF halving
 Employ half SF, e.g. employ SF64 to replace
SF128
 High layer scheduling
 Decrease the bit rate from up layer
Content

 RAKE Receiver
 Handover Control
 Compressed Mode
 Admission Control
 Load Control
 Code Resource Allocation
Admission Control
 The admission control is employed to admit the access of
incoming call. Its general principal is based on the
availability and utilization of the system resources.
 If the system has enough resources such as load margin,
code, and channel element etc. the admission control will
accept the call and allocate resources to it.
Purpose of Admission Control
 When user initiates a call , the admission control should
implement admission or rejection for this service according
to the resource situation.
 The admission control will sustain the system stability
firstly and try the best to satisfy the new calling service’s
QoS request, such as service rate, quality (SIR or BER),
and delay etc. basing on the radio measurement.
 Admission control is the only access entry for the incoming
services, its strategy will directly effect the cell capacity
and stability, e.g. call loss rate, call drop rate.
Admission Control in Uplink

Itotal_old+ΔI >Ithreshold Interference capacity

Access Service priority
Threshold Reserved capacity for
handover

The forecasted interference including the delta

interference brought by the incoming service is
calculated by the admission algorithm, and its
result depends on the QoS and transmission
propagation environment
Iown-
cell
The current RTWP (Received
Total Wide Power) value of cell, Iother-
which is reported by Node B cell
~
N0
Admission Control in Uplink
 Different ultimate user numbers
 Different interference threshold under different ultimate
user number conditions
 Different ultimate throughputs
Throughput -- The Total Bandwidth Received by Node B Quantity of Subscriber-- The Total Bandwidth Received by Node B

The Total Bandwidth Power Received by Node B (dBm)

The Total Bandwidth Power Received by Node B (dBm)

Quantity of Subscriber
Throughput

Ultimate Situation for different service rate

Admission Control in Downlink

Ptotal_old+△P>=Pthreshold Max TCP of cell

Access Service priority
Threshold Reserved capacity for
handover

The forecasted TCP value including delta

power required for the incoming service is
calculated by the admission algorithm, and its
result depends on the QoS and transmission
propagation environment.

The current TCP value of cell, which is reported by Node B

（Transmitted Carrier Power*Pmax）
Admission Control in Downlink

Red：low speed service

Blue：high speed service
The Total Transmission Power (dBm)

Quantity of Subscriber

The above figure illustrates the relation between ultimate user number
corresponds to different service rate and distance under equidistant
distribution condition
Admission Control Analysis
 The service can be either one-direction or bi-direction
type. For bi-direction service, it is admitted only after
both uplink and downlink are admitted.
 Admission control is the only access entry for the
incoming services, its strategy will directly effect the
cell capacity and stability, e.g. call loss rate, call drop
rate.
Content

 RAKE Receiver
 Handover Control
 Compressed Mode
 Admission Control
 Load Control
 Code Resource Allocation
Purpose of Load Control

The speed and position

Increased transmitted
changing of UE may
power will increase the
worsen the wireless
system load.
environment.

The purpose of load control is to keep the

system load under a pre-planned threshold
through several means of decreasing it, so as to
improve the system stability. Load control
Overload control

Cell load
Serious overload threshold

Common overload threshold

Admission control threshold

Overload recovery threshold

Overload control

1. The load exceeds the

common overload threshold
Common
Normal
overload
state
state
2. The load is smaller than the
overload recovery threshold

3. The load exceeds the serious overload threshold

6. The load is smaller than the serious overload threshold.

but greater than the common overload threshold
5. The load exceeds the
4. The load is smaller than the serious overload threshold.
overload recovery threshold
Serious
overload
state
Load Control Flows

Start

Light loaded Over loaded

Decision

Normal loaded

1. Handover in and access 1. Handover in 1.Handover in and

are allowed
2. Transmitted code power
(TCP) increase is allowed
3. RAB service rate
upgrade is allowed
and access are access are forbidden
allowed 2. TCP increase is
2. TCP increase forbidden
is allowed 3. RAB service rate
degrade
4. Handover out
5. Release call (call drop)
Load Control in Uplink
 Triggers
 RTWP (Received Total Wide-band Power) value from
measurement report exceeds the uplink overload threshold;
 Admission control is triggered when rejecting the access of
services with lower priority due to insufficient load capacity in uplink.
 Methods for decreasing load
 Decrease the target Eb/No of service in uplink;
 Decrease the rate of none real time data service;
 Handover to GSM system;
 Decrease the rate of real time service, e.g. voice call;
 Release calls.
 Methods for increasing load
 Increase the service rate.
Load Control in Downlink
 Triggers
 TCP (Transmitted Carrier Power) value from measurement report
exceeds the downlink overload threshold;
 Admission control is triggered when rejecting the access of
services with lower priority due to insufficient load capacity in
downlink.
 Methods for decreasing load
 Decrease the downlink target Eb/No of service in downlink;
 Decrease the rate of none real time data service;
 Handover to coverage-shared light loaded carrier;
 Handover to GSM system;
 Decrease the rate of real time service, e.g. voice call;
 Release calls.
 Methods for increasing load
 Increase the service rate.
Cell Breathing Effect

Cell breathing is
one of the means
for load control

The purpose of cell breathing is to share the load of hot-

spot cell with the light loaded neighbor cells, therefore to
improve the utilization of system capacity.
Example for load control

Cell Breathing Effect

 With the increase of activated
terminals and the increase of high
speed services, interference will
increase.
 The cell coverage area will shrink.
 Coverage blind spot occurs
 Drop of call will happen at the edge Coverage and
capacity are
of cell interrelated
Content

 RAKE Receiver
 Handover Control
 Compressed Mode
 Admission Control
 Load Control
 Code Resource Allocation
UMTS Code Resource

 Channelized Code (OVSF code)

 Uplink Channelized Code
 Downlink Channelized Code
 Scrambling Code
 Uplink Scrambling Code
 Downlink Scrambling Code
Function of OVSF Code

Downlink: distinguish different radio channels from the same NodeB.

OC3, OC4
OC1, OC2

OC5, OC6, OC7

Uplink: distinguish different radio channels from the same UE.

OC1, OC2
OC1 , OC2, OC3

OC1, OC2, OC3, OC4

Function of Scrambling code
 Downlink: distinguish different Cells
 Uplink: distinguish different UEs
Cell Site “1” transmits using PN code 1

PN1 PN1

PN3 PN4

Cell Site “2” transmits using PN code 2

PN2 PN2

PN5 PN6
Why Code Resource Planning?
 The OVSF (Orthogonal Variable Spreading Factor) code
tree is a scarce resource and only one code tree can be
used in each cell. In order to make full use of the capacity,
and support as many connections as possible, it is
important to plan and control the usage of channel code
resource.
 Downlink scrambling code allocation should be planned to
avoid the interference between neighboring cells.
 The uplink scrambling codes are sufficient, but RNC
should plan the codes to use for avoiding allocating same
code to different users in inter-RNC handover scenario.
Code Resource Planning
 The uplink and downlink scrambling code can be planned
easily by computer.
 The uplink channelized code does not need planning, for
every UE can use the whole code tree alone.
 Therefore, only the downlink channelized code is planned
with certain algorithm in RNC.
 Each cell has one primary scrambling code, which
correlates with a channel code tree. All the users under
this cell share this single code tree, so the OVSF code
resource is very limited.
 The downlink channelized code tree is a typical binary tree
with each layer corresponds to a certain SF ranging from
SF4 to SF512.
Generation of Channelized Code

Cch,4,0 =(1,1,1,1)
Cch,2,0 = (1,1)
Cch,4,1 = (1,1,-1,-1)
Cch,1,0 = (1)
Cch,4,2 = (1,-1,1,-1)
Cch,2,1 = (1,-1)
Cch,4,3 = (1,-1,-1,1)

SF = 1 SF = 2 SF = 4
OVSF Code Tree
Channelized Code Characters
 Code allocation restriction ：
 The code to be allocated must fulfill the condition that its
ancestor nodes including from father node to root node
and offspring nodes in the sub tree are not allocated;
 Code allocation side effect：
 The allocated node will block its ancestor nodes and
offspring nodes, thus the blocked nodes will not be
available for allocation until being unblocked .
SF=8

SF=16

SF=32
Strategy of Channelized Code Allocation

 Full utilization
 The fewer the blocked codes, the higher code tree
utilization rate.
 Low Complexity
 Short code first.
 Allocate codes for common channels and physical
shared channels prior to dedicated channels.
 Guarantee the code allocation for common physical
channels.
 Apply certain optimized strategy to allocate codes
for downlink dedicated physical channels.
An Example of Code Allocation
SF = 4

SF = 8

SF = 16

SF = 32
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Choose one
code from
three
SF = 4
candidates
SF = 8

SF = 16
SF = 32
16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31

Red spots represent the codes that have been allocated；

Green spots represent the codes that are blocked by the allocated offspring codes；
Blue spots represent the codes that are blocked by the allocated ancestor codes;
Black spots represent the codes that to be allocated;
Planning of downlink scrambling code

PN2

PN7 PN3 PN2

PN7 PN3 PN2

PN1

PN6 PN4 PN1 PN7 PN3

PN2 PN5 PN6 PN4 PN1

PN7 PN3 PN2 PN5 PN6 PN4

PN7 PN3 PN2 PN5

PN1

PN6 PN4 PN1 PN7 PN3

PN5 PN6 PN4 PN1

PN5 PN6 PN4

PN5