WHAT IS LTE--II

What is LTE eNB?

One of the biggest differences between LTE
network and legacy mobile communication system
3G is a base station.
There used to be intelligent and centralizing node
like RNC (Radio Network Controller) in 3G ,for
example.
It needed to control all the radio resources and
mobility over multiple NodeB (3G base stations)
underneath in hieratical radio access network.
All NodeB need to do is behave exactly according
to command from RNC through Iub interface.

In LTE, on the other hand, eNB (evolved NodeB) as

base station have to manage radio resource and
mobility in the cell and sector to optimize all the
UEs communication in flat radio network structure.
Therefore, the performance of LTE eNB depends on
radio resource management algorithm and its
implementation.

3G Radio Access Network (UTRAN) Architecture

E-UTRAN Architecture

Physical Interface
According to Overview of 3GPP, LTE radio access
technology is described as follows:
The multiple access scheme for the LTE physical
layer is based on Orthogonal Frequency Division
Multiple Access (OFDM) with a Cyclic Prefix (CP) in
the downlink and a Single Carrier Frequency
Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA) with CP in the
uplink.
OFDMA technique is particularly suited for
frequency selective channel and high data rate.

 It transforms a wideband frequency selective

channel into a set of parallel flat fading narrowband
channels, thanks to CP.
This ideally, allows the receiver to perform a low
complex equalization process in frequency domain,
i.e., 1 tap scalar equalization.
The baseband signal representing a downlink physical
channel is defined in terms of the following steps:
scrambling of coded bits in each of the code words to
be transmitted on a physical channel
modulation of scrambled bits to generate complexvalued modulation symbols
mapping of the complex-valued modulation symbols
onto one or several transmission layers
precoding of the complex-valued modulation symbols
on each layer for transmission on the antenna ports
mapping of complex-valued modulation symbols for
each antenna port to resource elements
generation of complex-valued time-domain OFDM
signal for each antenna port
The baseband signal representing the physical uplink
shared channel is defined in terms of the following
steps, as shown in the below figure:
scrambling
modulation of scrambled bits to generate complexvalued symbols
transform precoding to generate complex-valued
symbols
mapping of complex-valued symbols to resource
elements

 generation of complex-valued time-domain SC-FDMA

signal for each antenna port

Overview of downlink physical channel

processing.

Overview of uplink physical channel processing.

C-plane Protocol Procedures

C-plane protocol procedure test is mandatory, and
it includes not only functional testing but also the
testing under load condition.
There are multiple protocol procedures in C-plane,
and all the procedures are covered in this section.
Equipment venders test RRC connection
establishment/release procedure as functional test
in early phase of eNB system testing.
RRC Connection Establishment/Release Procedure

The first step to evaluate the C-place protocol is to

test the basic function, such as connection
establishment/release procedure for LTE eNB. In
RRC protocol in E-UTRAN, there are only two
states, RRC_IDLE and RRC_CONNECTED (shown
in Figure A below), so that connection can be set up
faster.
Connection establishment and release procedure
initiated by UE on Uu and S1 interface is shown in
Figure B. Paging (Connection establishment and

release procedure initiated by E-UTRAN) on Uu and

S1 interface is shown in Figure.
RRC protocol procedure is described in details in
3GPP TS36.331. In order to evaluate C-plane
performance of LTE eNB, the reliable transition
between these two states is critical.

RRC Protocol State Transition

Connection Establish and Release Procedure

LTE Deployment Status

2012 is going to be year of LTE in terms

trials and commercial launches.

In the first week of this year 3 commercial

LTE launches have already been announced

so far, operators are Viva (Bahrain), T
Mobile (Hungary) and KT (South Korea).
In total 30+ commercial LTE rollouts are

expected this year.

As

of now 49 LTE networks has been

commercially launched in 29 countries.
Including these total 226 firm LTE network
deployments are planned or in progress in
76 countries, says a recent GSA report.

A further 59 operators in 17 additional

countries are engaged in pre-commercial

LTE technology pilot trials, tests or studies.
LTE small cell deployments are expected to

form a key market trend in 2012 as well. A

number of operators including Verizon and
Sprint have already committed to LTE
femtocells.,

 SK Telecom has announced completion of

the development of 'Wi-Fi Integrated LTE

Femtocell.
A survey conducted recently had shown

that 60% of operators believe that small

cells will be more important than macro
cells in LTE networks.
On subscriber base, LTE subscriptions are

reaching to 6.4 million that currently

comprise only 0.1 % of the total market
(6.1
billion
global
cellular
network
subscriptions).

According to Research and Markets, LTE

subscriptions will significantly grow over
the next 5 years, eventually representing
more than 8 % of the market in 2016.

Presently, U.S operator Verizon Wireless

and Japanese operator NTT DoCoMo are

leading the LTE market with market shares
of 63 % and 22 % respectively

India's Bharti Airtel is reported to have

awarded a contract to China's ZTE for the
deployment of an LTE based 4G network in
Kolkata circle
.

Bharti Airtel owns BWA licenses in Maharashtra, Kolkata,

Karnataka and Punjab, where it can deploy WiMAX or LTE

Networks. The Zte contract covering Kolkata may be
extended to other circles

Abbreviations
3G

3rd Generation

3.5G

3.5th Generation

3GPP

3rd Generation Partnership Project

4G

4th Generation

AAA

Authentication, Authorization and Accounting

ACK

Acknowledgement

ACLR

Adjacent Channel Leakage Ratio

ACS

Adjacent Channel Selectivity

aGW

Access Gateway

AM

Acknowledge Mode

AMC

Adaptive Modulation and Coding

ARQ

Automatic Repeat Request

AS

Access Stratum

ASN.1

Abstract Syntax Notation One

ASSP

Application Specific Standard Product

ATT

Attenuator

BBERF

Bearer Binding and Event Reporting Function

BCCH

Broadcast Control Channel

BCH

Broadcast Channel

BER

Basic Encoding Rules

BER

Bit Error Rate

BS

Base Station

CCCH

Common Control Channel

CDMA

Code Division Multiple Access

CELL_DCH

Cell Dedicated Channel

CN

Core Network

CP

Cyclic Prefix

CPU

Central Processing Unit

C-plane

Control Plane

CPRI

Common Public Radio Interface

CQI

Channel Quality Indicator

CRC

Cyclic Redundancy Check

C-RNTI

Cell Radio Network Temporary Identifier

CS-CN

Circuit Switch Core Network

DCCH

Dedicated Control Channel

DL

Downlink

DL-SCH

Downlink Shared Channel

DRX

Discontinuous Reception

DSP

Digital Signal Processor

DTCH

Dedicated Traffic Channel

DTX

Discontinuous Transmission

DUT

Device Under Test

eNB

E-UTRAN NodeB

EPC

Evolved Packet Core

ePDG

Evolved Packet Data Gateway

EPS

Evolved Packet Service

E-UTRA

Evolved UTRA

E-UTRAN

Evolved UTRAN

EVM

Error Vector Magnitude

FDD

Frequency Division Duplex

FPGA

Field Programmable Gate Array

GbE

Gigabit Ethernet

GERAN

GSM EDGE Radio Access Network

GSM

Global System for Mobile communication

HARQ

Hybrid ARQ

HSS

Home Subscriber Server

HO

Handover

HSDPA

High Speed Downlink Packet Access

HPCRF

Home Policy and Charging Rules Function

HSPA

High Speed Packet Access

HSUPA

High Speed Uplink Packet Access

I/F

Interface

IE

Information Element

IMS

IP Multimedia Subsystem

IP

Internet Protocol

LTE

Long Term Evolution

MAC

Medium Access Control

MAC

Media Access Control

MBMS

Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Service

MCCH

Multicast Control Channel

MCH

Multicast Channel

MCH

Micro-TCA Connection Handler

MIB

Master Information Block

MIMO

Multiple Input Multiple Output

MME

Mobile Management Entity

MSC

Mobile Switching Center

MTCH

MBMS Traffic Channel

NACK

Non-Acknowledgement

NAS

Non Access Stratum

OBSAI

Open Base Station Architecture Initiative

OFDM

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing

OFDMA

Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access

O&M

Operation and Management

PBCH

Physical Broadcast Channel

PBR

Prioritized bit rate

PCCH

Paging Control Channel

PCEF

Policy and Charging Enforcement Function

PCFICH

Physical Control Format Indicator Channel

PCH

Paging Channel

PCRF

Policy and Charging Rules Function

PDCP

Packet Data Convergence Protocol

PDCCH

Physical Downlink Control Channel

PDSCH

Physical Downlink Shared Channel

PDU

Protocol Data Unit

PDN

Packet Data Network

P-GW

PDN Gateway

PER

Packed Encoding Rules

PER

Packet Error Rate

PHICH

Physical HARQ Indicator Channel

PHY

Physical Layer

PICMG

PCI Industrial Computer Manufacturers Group

PLMN

Public Land Mobile Network

P-SS

Primary Synchronization Signal

PUCCH

Physical Downlink Common Channel

PUSCH

Physical Uplink Shared Channel

PRACH

Physical Random Access Channel

PS-CN

Packet Switch Core Network

QA

Quality Assurance

QAM

Quadrature Amplitude Modulation

QoS

Quality of Service

R99

Release 99

RACH

Random Access Channel

RAT

Radio Access Technology

RB

Radio Bearer

RF

Radio Frequency

RLC

Radio Link Control

ROHC

RObust Header Compression

RNC

Radio Network Controller

RNS

Radio Network System

RRC

Radio Resource Control

RRM

Radio Resource Management

S1

Interface between eNB and aGW

S1AP

S1 Application Protocol

S1-C

S1-Control plane

S1-U

S1-User plane

SA

Signal Analyzer

SAE

System Architecture Evolution

SBR

Signaling Radio Bearer

SC-FDMA

Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access

SCH

Synchronization Signal

SCTP

Stream Control Transmission Protocol

SFN

System Frame Number

SG

Signal Generator

S-GW

Serving Gateway

SGSN

Serving GPRS Support Node

SIB

System Information Block

SISO

Single Input Single Output

SDMA

Spatial Division Multiple Access

SDU

Service Data Unit

SPR

Subscription Profile Repository

SPS

Semi-Persistent Scheduling

SR

Scheduling Request

sRIO

Serial Rapid I/O

S-SS

Secondary Synchronization Signal

TCP

Transmission Control Protocol

TM

Transparent Mode

TTI

Transmission Time Interval

UCI

Uplink Control Information

UE

User Equipment

UL

Uplink

UMTS

Universal Mobile Telecommunication System

U-plane

User plane

UL-SCH

Uplink Shared Channel

UTRA

Universal Terrestrial Radio Access

UTRAN

Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network

VLR

Visitor Location Register

VPCRF

Visited Policy and Charging Rules Function

WCDMA

Wideband CDMA

WLAN

Wireless Local Area Network

WiMAX

Wireless Interface for Microwave Access

X2

Interface between eNBs

X2-C

X2-Control plane

X2-U

X2-User plane