EVDO Basics

Contents

 CDMA Evolution Path

 Comparison between CDMA 1X and EVDO
 Forward Link Frame Structure
 Reverse Link Frame Structure
 Forward Link Channel Structure
 Reverse Link Channel Structure

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CDMA Evolution Path

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Comparison between CDMA 1X and EVDO
1X 1X EVDO Rev 0 1X EVDO Rev A
Data Type Data + Voice Data Data + VoIP
Max Data Rate 307.2 Kbps 38.4 kbps-2.45676 3.1 Mbps
(Forward Link) Mbps
Max Data Rate 307.2 Kbps 9.6 kbps - 153.6 kbps 4.8 kbps -1.8 Mbps
(Reverse Link)
Forward Link F-FCH, F-SCH, F- Traffic/Pilot/MAC Traffic/Pilot/MAC
Channels for Packet SCCH MAC= RPC,RA,DRC MAC= RPC,RA,DRC
Data Lock Lock, ARQ
Reverse Link R-FCH Pilot/ACK/Data/ Pilot/ACK/Data/
Channels for Packet R-SCH MAC=RRI, DRC MAC=RRI,DRC,DSC
Data
Data Control Power Power Control Sub -RRI -RRI
Channel Channels (RL/FL) -RPC (Fwd MAC Ch) -RPC (Fwd MAC Ch)
Modulation BPSK, QPSK QPSK,8-PSK, QAM QPSK,8-PSK, QAM
Channel Coding Convolution /Turbo Turbo Turbo
FL Data Rate Base Station MS MS
selection
FL Power Variable Full Power Full Power
Management
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Forward Link Frame Structure
 On the fwd link, EV-DO Rev 0 uses TDMA in tandem with CDMA.
 1 CDMA channel is 32768 chips long and lasts 26.67ms. This is one
physical channel comprising of time multiplexed channels – Pilot,
MAC, Traffic & Control.
 The FL is broken up into slots. Each slot is of duration 1.667ms. A set
of 16 slots make up a group called a “frame” (duration: 26.67ms).
 Some slots are used to carry the control channel for everyone to hear;
most slots are intended for individual users.
 Each slot is transmitted at maximum power.
 Users don’t “own” long continuing series of slots like in TDMA or GSM;
instead, each slot or small string of slots is dynamically addressed to
whoever needs it at the moment.

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Forward Slot Structure

 The main “cargo” in a slot is the DATA being sent to a user

 But all users need to get continuous timing and administrative information,
even when all the slots are going to somebody else.
 Twice in every slot there is regularly-scheduled burst of timing and
administrative information for everyone to use
• MAC (Media Access Control) information such as power control bits
• a burst of pure Pilot
– allows new mobiles to acquire the cell and decide to use it
– keeps existing user mobiles exactly on sector time
– mobiles use it to decide which sector should send them their next forward
link packet
 In case there are no ATs having active connections with an Access Node (AN) or
Base Station (BTS), the AN still transmits the pilots. In such a scenario, each
pilot burst is guarded by two 64 chip “guard”/”skirt” bursts which improves pilot
acquisition and SNR computation by the ATs

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Control Channel Cycle

 A Control Channel Cycle is 16 frames ( 16*26.67ms = 436.67 ms)

 The first half of the first frame has all of its slots reserved for
possible use carrying Control Channel packets
 The last half of the first frame, and all of the remaining 15
frames, have their slots available for ordinary use transmitting
sub packets to users

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Reverse Link Frame Structure

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1 X EVDO Channel Overview
Forward Channel (TD-CDMA)
• Pilot Channel
•Forward Control Channel
• Forward Traffic Channel
•MAC = Rev Activity (RA), Rev Power Control (RPC),
DRC Lock, ARQ

Reverse Access Channel

AN • Pilot Channel AT
• Data Channel

Reverse Traffic Channel

• Pilot Channel
• Aux Pilot
• MAC = Rev Rate Indicator(RRI), Data Rate Control
(DRC), Data Source Control (DSC)
• ACK (Acknowledgement ) Channel
• Data Channel

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Forward Channel Structure

Forward

Medium
Pilot Access Control Control Traffic
(MAC)

Reverse Reverse Power

DRC Lock ARQ
Activity Control

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 Forward Channel Structure
The 1X EVDO forward channel structure is time multiplexed in the following Channels:
 The pilot channel comprises of a simple sequence of zeros, covered by the reserved
Walsh cover 64W0. Pilot Channel used by AT for:
 Initial Acquisition
 Phase and Timing recovery
 Coherent demodulation
 Estimate receive C/I for forward data rate control

 The MAC channel contains information for the set of active ATs in the sector. It also acts
as a “guard” for the pilot burst in each slot.
MAC consists of two sub channels:
 Reverse Activity Channel : The Reverse Activity (RA) Channel transmits the
Reverse Activity Bit (RAB) stream over the MAC Channel with MACIndex 4. The RA
bit is transmitted in every slot at an effective data rate of 600 bps. The AT uses this
information to help determine the data rate for transmission on the reverse link.
 Reverse Power Control: In Rel A, RPC updates are sent at a rate of 150 bps
(updates/second). In Rel 0, RPC is done at 600 bps. ‘0’ means increase AT power
and ‘1’ means decrease AT power.
 The DRC Lock sub-channel indicates to the AT whether the DRC information
sent by the AT was correctly decoded at the AN or not.
The ARQ channel coupled with the Data Rate Control (DRC) and Ack Channel
provides the handshake to increase the Access Terminal’s data throughput
performance, resulting in increased capacity of the system.
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 The RPC, ARQ and DRC Lock channels are multiplexed together as per the following
table.

 The RPC Channel is time-division multiplexed with the ARQ Channel and transmitted in
1 slot out of every 4 slots.

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 Control channel combines the functions of the synchronization, paging and
system information channels. This channel is time division multiplexed with the
traffic channel, on the data portion of the slot. A control channel packet is
transmitted at least once every 256 slots (or 16 frames). The CCH is transmitted
either at 38.4 or at 76.8 Kbps.
 The traffic channel carries the user data. This stream is time division multiplexed
with the control channel, on the data part of each slot.
 The Forward Traffic Channel carries user data in the form of encoded Physical
Layer packets. Transmission is a variable rate from 38.4 kbps up to 2.4576 Mbps.
The number of slots used is a function of the data rate.
 The transmission of the Pilot and MAC Channels is synchronized between all
sectors within a network. This permits the AT to measure all pilots simultaneously.
 Transmissions from all sectors are synchronized, yielding overlapped pilot burst
at the AT receiver. This is the basis for estimating the co-channel interference. In
the case of the transmission of Idle slots, the adjacent MAC channels provide
overlap margin against differential over the air time delay skew.

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MAC Index
 The RPC and DRC Lock sub-channels are time division multiplexed on
the MAC channel. The RAC is code division multiplexed with the
RPC/DRC Lock.
 The AN must “address” the RPC/DRC Lock sub-channels for the
intended AT. The addressing is achieved using a “MAC Index” that is
assigned to each active AT in the sector

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Reverse Channel Structure

Indicates that the channel is newly introduced in Rel A

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Access Channel
 The access channel is used by the AT to initiate communication with the
AN or to respond to a page.
 Each access probe consists of a preamble followed by an access channel
data packet. The preamble duration is 1 frame, or 16 slots. During the
preamble, only the pilot channel is transmitted. The access channel data
packet is transmitted over 4 frames. During the access channel data
packet, both the pilot and access data packets are transmitted using code
division multiplexing.
 The pilot channel is transmitted over the I-phase and the Data Channel is
transmitted over the Q-Phase.

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 Traffic Channel

 The RL traffic channel consists of code division multiplexed information

streams on I and Q phases.
 CDM (Code Division Multiplexing) is utilized to simultaneously transmit
multiple channels.
 The ACK and DSC channel are time-multiplexed together.
 The auxiliary pilot channel is optional and is used at higher rates.
 The pilot channel in the reverse traffic channel structure is different from
that in the access channel structure.
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 The reverse link Pilot Channel transmits a string of unmodulated
symbols with a binary value of 0 using a 16-bit Walsh Code 0 over the In-
phase channel.
 Reverse Link Traffic Auxiliary Pilot Channel is transmitted in addition to
the regular pilot channel. at high data rates, the process of
demodulation can be enhanced by allowing transmission of an auxiliary
pilot channel. the auxiliary pilot is transmitted only when the payload
meets or exceeds a configurable threshold. This threshold ranges
between 128 and 12288 bits.
 The auxiliary pilot consists of all 0s spread with the 32-bit Walsh Code
28.
 The power level of the auxiliary pilot is specified relative to the pilot
channel.
 The Reverse Link MAC channel consists of the following channels
separated by a Walsh Code:
 Reverse Rate Indicator (RRI) channel
 Data Rate Control (DRC) channel
 Data Source Control (DSC) channel

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 Reverse Rate Indication (RRI) Channel
RRI Channel is transmitted using it’s own 16-chip Walsh Code over the In-Phase
channel.
The RRI channel is a 6 bit symbol that – 4 bits to indicate the payload size and 2 bit sub-
packet identifier.
The sub-packet identifier of the current transmission facilitates reverse link H-ARQ and
the payload size identification assists in avoiding blind rate detection at the AN.
 Data Rate Control Channel (DRC)
The DRC channel is used by the AT to indicate the serving sector as well as the
requested data rate.
A 4 bit DRC value specifies the data rate and the serving sector is identified via 8-ary
Walsh code function. The Walsh code also performs the function of spreading the
DRC channel.
DRC 13 corresponds to a nominal data rate of 1.536 Mbps, and DRC 14 allows the
Forward Traffic Channel transmission to be as high as 3.072 Mbps.
 Data Source Control Channel (DSC)
The purpose of the DSC is to give the RNC advance notice of the AT’s intent to switch
cells. Therefore, while the RNC is transitioning the data to the new cell, the AT can
continue requesting data from its current cell. The use of the DSC reduces the inter-
cell latency.
The DSC channel is time-division multiplexed with the ACK channel and is always
transmitted in the second half slot.

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The DSC value is effective one slot after its transmission and stays in effect
for a duration specified by the DSCLength.
The DSC values are transmitted at a rate of 600/DSCLength per second.

 The ACK channel is time-division multiplexed with the DSC channel and is
always transmitted in the first half slot. It is used by the AT to confirm the
successful reception of a packet or indicate that a packet was not
received.

 The Reverse Link Traffic Data Channel carries the user data. The Reverse
Traffic Channel utilizes sub-frames to transmit sub-packets (1 sub-packet
= 4 slots = 6.67ms). The data rate can change every 6.67ms.

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 All the reverse channels are orthogonally spread with Walsh functions
called Walsh covers at a chip rate of 1.2288 Mcps.
 Pilot Channel : 16-chip Walsh function number 0 -- W016
 Ack Channel : 8-chip Walsh function number 4 -- W48
DRC Channel : 16-chip Walsh function number 8 – W816
Data Channel : 4-chip Walsh function number 2 – W24
 Each traffic is direct sequence spread by a distinct user PN code
sequence.

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