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Differences between
the GSM and CDMA Wireless Networks
Abstract
GSM and CDMA have been the two leading commercial wireless technologies that are
being used all over the world. This paper presents to the readers the key differences
between the two technologies1. The various topics in which this paper presents the
difference are:
• Radio Spectrum Usage
• Network architecture differences
• Radio channel differences
• Call Processing
• Evolution to 3G
• Network capacity differences
• Deployment
Introduction
This section presents the basic wireless network architecture and lays the foundation for
the readers to understand the later sections of this paper.
Though this paper concentrates on the differences between these networks, but the basic
network architecture for both these networks is same.
The diagram below presents the general architecture of a wireless network.
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Figure 1: General Architecture of Wireless Networks
The Mobile Station (MS) is the user equipment in Wireless Networks.. Production of
Mobile Stations is done by many different manufacturers, and there will almost always be
a wide range of different Mobile Stations in a mobile network. Therefore the
specifications specify the workings of the MS in great detail.
The Base Transceiver Station (BTS) is the entity corresponding to one site
communicating with the Mobile Stations. Usually, the BTS will have an antenna with
several TRXs (radio transceivers) that each communicates on radio frequency. The link-
level signaling on the radio-channels is interpreted in the BTS, whereas most of the
higher-level signaling is forwarded to the BSC and MSC
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The Base Station Controller
Each Base Station Controller (BSC) control the magnitude of several hundred BTSs. The
BSC takes care of a number of different procedures regarding call setup, location update
and handover for each MS. The handover control procedures will come especially into
focus in this thesis. It is the BSC that decides when handover is necessary. This is
accomplished by analyzing the measurement results that are sent from the MS during a
call and ordering the MS to perform handover if this is necessary. The continuous
analyzing of measurements from many MSs requires considerable computational power.
This put strong constraints on the design of the BSC.
With each MSC, there is associated a Visitors Location Register (VLR). The VLR can be
associated with one or several MSCs. The VLR stores data about all customers who are
roaming withing the location area of that MSC. This data is updated with the location
update procedure initiated from the MS through the MSC, or directly from the subscriber
Home Location Register (HLR). The HLR is the home register of the subscriber.
Subscription information, allowed services, authentication information and localization of
the subscriber are at all times stored in the HLR. This information may be obtained by the
VLR/MSC when necessary. When the subscriber roams into the location area of another
VLR/MSC, the HLR is updated. At mobile terminated calls, the HLR is interrogated to
find which MSC the MS is registered with. Because the HLR is a centralized database
that need to be accessed during every call setup and data transmission in the GSM
network, this entity need to have a very large data transmission capacity suggests a
scheme for distributing the data in the HLR in order to reduce the load.
The communication between MSC, VLR and HLR is done using the MAP (Mobile
Application Part) of the Signalling System 7. The MAP is defined in and will be further
discussed in
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Historical View of GSM and CDMA
GSM
The first step towards GSM was the allocation of a common frequency band in 1978,
twice 25 MHz, at around 900 MHz for mobile communication in Europe. In 1990, the
GSM specifications for 900 MHz were frozen. In 1990 it was decided that GSM 1800
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Classification of CDMA
Frequency
Direct sequence
Frequency hopping
Time hopping
Time
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Table 2 – CDMA Era
Pioneer Era
1949 John Pierce : time hopping spread spectrum
1949 Claude Shannon and Robert Pierce : basic ideas of CDMA
1950 De Rosa-Rogoff : direct sequence spread spectrum
1956 Price and Green : antimultipath “RAKE” patent
1961 Magnuski : near-far problem
1970s Several developments for military field and navigation systems
Table 3 shows the technical parameters of second generation systems. All these
systems are frequency division duplex (FDD) systems. They transmit and receive
in different frequency bands. Time division duplex (TDD). The actual data rate
available in commercial systems is usually much smaller. In 1998 GSM supports
14.4 Kbps, IS-95 9.6 Kbps, IS-136 9.6Kbps and PDC 9.6 Kbps.
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Table 3 – Second Generation Digital Systems
a
Gaussian minimum shift keying
b
Differential quadrature phase shift keying
c
Offset QPSK
d
A “chip” is used to denote a spread symbol in DS-CDMA systems
e
Regular pulse excited long term prediction
f
Vector sum excited linear predictive
g
Algebraic code excited linear predictive
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Comparison of Technologies
The frequency spectrum is divided into number of narrow band channels. These channels
are assigned to users. Therefore, users transmit in their assigned frequency range. This is
the assigned dynamically. The frequency range can be reassigned once the call is
completed. The frequency assigned serves as channel identifier.
As in FDMA, TDMA divides the spectrum into narrow band channels. However, in
TDMA, the same channel is assigned to multiple users. The available time is divided into
a number of time slots. These slots are assigned to users sharing the same channel. Thus,
TDMA provides more spectral efficiency than FDMA. The capacity is increased N times,
where N is the number of timeslots within in a channel. Thus, N users can be
accommodated in a channel. The frequency assignment, along with the assigned time
slot, serves as a channel identifier. This technology is used in GSM.
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Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA):
In CDMA, all users share the wideband spectrum. Each user is spread with a pseudo-
random binary sequence. The wide band frequency assignment (common to all users)
along with a pseudo-random sequence serves as the channel identifier.
Network Architecture
This section presents the differences between the GSM and CDMA network
architectures.
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The diagram below shows the IS-95 based CDMA network architecture:
Mobile Station:
GSM:
The mobile station (MS) consists of the mobile equipment (the terminal) and a smart card
called the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM). The SIM provides personal mobility, so that
the user can have access to subscribed services irrespective of a specific terminal. By
inserting the SIM card into another GSM terminal, the user is able to receive calls at that
terminal, make calls from that terminal, and receive other subscribed services.
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CDMA:
One of the biggest drawbacks of the CDMA mobile stations is the absence of the SIM
card. As a result of this, a user’s identity is fixed to a handset.
Electronic Serial Number (ESN) uniquely identifies the mobile equipment. ESN is a
32bit number assigned by the mobile station manufacturer.
An IMSI and ESN are linked in the operator database to uniquely identify a subscriber.
Cell Design
In CDMA, the same 1.233 MHz wideband channel may be reused in all the cells.
Therefore, adjacent cells may use the same frequency; thus the frequency reuse factor is
1. This greatly simplifies the frequency planning.
On the other hand in GSM, the frequency assignments in one cell cannot be reused in
adjacent cells. Hence, frequency assignments in each cell have to be carefully allocated to
avoid interference from adjacent cells.
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Base Station Sub-System (BSS):
Where as in CDMA , the TRAU is called the Vocoders and they are considered as part of
the BSC.
Another key difference in the BSS is that the CDMA BSS gets the time synchronization
between the various Network elements using the GPS, where as in GSM is it controlled
by the MSC and BSS interface.
The radio interface in the wireless systems provides the link between the fixed
infrastructure of different operators and the mobile station of various manufacturers.
The radio link directed from the mobile station to the network is called the uplink. This is
also referred to as the reverse link in CDMA networks.
The radio link directed from network to the mobile station is called the downlink. This is
referred to as the forward link in the CDMA networks.
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Channels are used in pair for full duplex communications. Thus, GSM uses both uplink
and downlink bands of a given spectrum.
In other words, a physical channel refers to a pair of frequencies used for a cellular radio
talk path. One is used for the cell site to mobile transmission while the other is used for
the mobile to the cell site transmission.
GMS signal requires channels spacing of 200kHz.
In CDMA two types of PN codes are used for differentiating the forward and the reverse
links.
Short Codes
These PN codes are generated with a register length of 15. The length of the code is 2 15-
(32,768) bits. Generated at the rate of 1.2288MHz, these codes repeat every 26.67 msec.
Each base station generates a short code with a different offset that identifies the base
station.
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Long Code
There is only one long code, it is defined in the standard, and it is used by all IS-95 and
cdma 2000 systems. The long PN code is generated with a register length of 42.
Generated at the rate of 1.2288MHz, this code repeats in approximately in 41 days. In the
reverse direction, the long code is used for spreading (mobile to the base station) and to
uniquely identify each channel. When the mobile needs to uniquely identify itself or a
channel using the long code, it applies a long code mask to the long code, which results
in a time shifted version of the long code. The receiver applies the same mask to recover
the data.
The diagrams below shows the logical channel structures of both CDMA and GSM
networks.
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The major difference between the GSM and the CDMA logical channels is how they are
identified. In GSM each logical channel is pre-assigned to a particular time slot and in
CDMA they are identified by a pre-assigned Walsh code.
And also in the traffic channel, during the call setup in a GMS the mobile is assigned to a
time slot whereas in CDMA a particular Walsh code is assigned.
Call Processing
Both GSM and CDMA networks have similar call setup flows for the origination and the
termination of calls and location management.
But the major difference is in the CDMA networks, which has both hard handoff and soft
handoff whereas GSM networks have only hard handoffs.
Another major difference is how both these networks handle the Near-Far effect.
In GSM, during traffic a time slot is allocated for the mobile, when the mobile moves far
away from the base station its round trip delay increases and the mobile tends to drift to
another user time slot. To avoid this, time advance feature is used in GSM networks.
Similarly in CDMA networks, within a cell, mobiles are different radial distances from
the base station. If all the mobiles transmit at equal power, the level received at the base
station differs from one mobile to another. Mobiles that are nearer are received at
significantly high power than the mobiles that are farther away. Because the transmission
loss is higher for mobiles farther from the base station, mobiles near to the base station
can cause more interference to the mobiles. Introducing power control during the call in
the CDMA networks solves this problem.
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Evolution to 3G
The diagram below shows the 3G evolution paths taken by each network.
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GSM to GPRS:
New additions: Packet core network nodes – SGSN and GGSN.
Modifications: BSC hardware and software
No Changes: Circuit core network (MSC, HLR, AuC), Air Interface (MS-BTS) and A-
Interface (BSC-MSC)
The diagram below shows a 2.5 G GSM – GPRS network.
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GSM /GPRS to UMTS:
New additions: WCDMA Air Interface (UE-Node B), RAN Interfaces, Iub (Node B –
RNC), IuR (RNC- RNC), CN Interface Iu (MSC- RNC & SGSN – RNC)
Modifications: MSC and SGSN for Iu Interface.
No Changes: Circuit core network (HLR, AuC), Packet Core Network (GGSN)
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IS 95 to CDMA 2000:
New additions: Packet core network (PDSN, AAA, HA/FA), New Interface R-P (PDSN –
BSS)
Modifications: Air Interface (MS-BSS), Network Interface (BSC- MSC)
No Changes: Circuit core network (HLR, AC)
Conclusion:
This paper tried to capture the technical differences between the world’s two biggest
wireless networks – GSM and CDMA. From the practical deployment point of view
GMS captured Europe, Asia and Africa where as CDMA has been deployed in the
Americas and some parts of Asia like Japan and Korea.
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Reference:
• http://www.arcx.com/sites/index.htm
• GSM Wireless Networks – Nortel Networks Training Division
• IS –95 Overview – Award Solutions
• www.gmsworld.com
• The GSM systems for Mobile Communications – Michel Mouly
• Introduction to 3G Mobile Communications – Juha
• Future Mobile networks 3G and beyond - Alan
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