Performance of 3GPP High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA)

Robert Love, Amitava Ghosh, Weimin Xiao and Rapeepat Ratasuk

Abstract:High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) technology was standardized for 3GPP W-CDMA Release-5.
HSDPA includes advanced techniques such as adaptive modulation and coding (AMC), Hybrid ARQ (HARQ), and fast
scheduling. HSDPA can deliver a 3x increase in sector and a 6x increase in user throughput for some traffic models.
Additionally HSDPA can support almost a 4x increase in the number of users compared to UMTS Release-99 for the
same service. With advanced receivers, HSDPA can support broadband quality service with 60 users per site. This
paper provides an overview of the physical layer aspects of HSDPA and discusses the improvements in sector and user
throughput (with respect to Release-99 UMTS) resulting from HSDPA with joint scheduling and resource allocation.

I. Introduction The lower frame size improves fat pipe multiplexing,

The promises of the wireless revolution are finally
starting to reach fruition given the evolution of third
generation (3G) technologies, which will enable the
complete multimedia mobile experience, anytime,
anyplace, and anywhere for a reasonable cost.
Mobile Broadband is made possible by an upgrade to the
UMTS (WCDMA) radio interface, known as High Speed
Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA), which can deliver a
3-fold increase in sector and a 6x increase in user
throughput for some traffic models as compared to UMTS
Release-99 (R99). This paper provides an overview of
the physical layer aspects of HSDPA and discusses in
detail the improvements in sector and user throughput
(with respect to R99 UMTS) resulting from HSDPA. An
overview of HSDPA technology is presented in Section
II. Section III presents a brief description of associated
control channels for HSDPA. A summary of scheduling
and resource allocation techniques is presented in Section
IV. Section V compares in detail the system performance
of HSDPA and R99 UMTS under various scenanos
followed by conclusions given in Section VI.
II. Overview of HSDP A
multi-user diversity, and HARQ.
A High Speed Downlink Shared Channel (HS-DSCH)
transmission uses channelization codes at a fixed
spreading factor of 16. The TTl of an HS-DSCH sub
frame is 2msec compared to 10 msec for R99 WCDMA.
The HS-DSCH supports both QPSK and l 6-QAM
modulation. Multi-code transmission is allowed, which
translates to mobiles being assigned multiple
channelization codes (CCs) in the same HS-DSCH sub
frame, depending on its capability. The same scrambling
code sequence is applied to all the CCs. Furthermore,
multiple UEs may be assigned CCs in the same TTl, i.e.
multiplexing of multiple mobiles in the code-domain is
allowed which is illustrated in Figure 1.
In HSDPA, AMC, HARQ and scheduling are handled by
the Node-B, which allows for fast link adaptation based
on instantaneous channel conditions. Multi-channel stop
and-wait ARQ is the underlying fonn of ARQ, rather than
selective repeat with a large window size. Multi-channel
stop-and-wait ARQ with a small number of channels
(e.g., 6) is an efficient, simple protocol that minimizes the
memory required for HARQ and stalling. Signaling IS
provided to allow fully asynchronous operation.

HSDPA technology has been standardized in 3GPP

CPICH
UMTS Release-5 (R5) of W-CDMA. HSDPA includes Time Ref.
the following advanced techniques:
Power &

-j
HS-PDSCH Code
Adaptive modulation and coding (AMC) Code
Space
(Not necessarily
Hybrid Automatic Repeat request (HARQ) contiguous)

Higher peak rates (up to l 4Mbps) I TTID I TTlt I TTI2 I TTI3 I TTI4 I

De-centralized architecture where scheduling

-------I.Time
2ms
functions are moved from RNC to Node-B thus
reducing latency and allowing fast scheduling. Figure 1 - Multiplexing ofUE's in the code domain.

These techniques improve average data sector throughput

by approximately 3-4 times (compared to R99 UMTS
Downlink Shared Channel (DSCH resulting in
significantly higher spectral efficiency. A significant
reduction in overall delay was enabled by moving the
scheduling and HARQ functionality from Radio Network
Controller (RNC) to Node-B and using lower frame size
(also known as transmission time interval (TTl of 2 ms.
III. Control Channel Design for HSDPA
Design of the associated control channel is very important
to maximize the throughput of HS-DSCH. The overall
control channel structure of the HS-DSCH is shown in
Figure 2. On the downlink, high-speed data is transmitted
on the HS-DSCH while the associated signaling
information is transmitted by the High Speed Shared
Control Channel (HS-SCCH). The signaling information

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 includes Transport Format and Resource Information and
HARQ related information. On the uplink, the new High
Speed Dedicated Physical Control Channel (HS-DPCCH)
is used to signal HARQ acknowledgement and the
Channel Quality Indicator (CQI) up to the Node B. The
HS-DPCCH is a separate code multiplexed uplink
channel. Concurrent to high-speed data, regular data and
control information may also be transmitted on the
Dedicated Physical Data and Control Channels (DPDCH
and DPCCH).
DL-DPDCH
DL-DPCCH
HS-DSCH
HS-PDSCH
HS-DPCCH
HS-SCCH
User Equipment
Figure 2 - Control Channel Structure for HSDPA
For each HS-DSCH TTl, downlink signaling for one
mobile is carried on the HS-SCCH. The number of HS
SCCHs can range from one to a maximum of four. The
mobile has the capability to simultaneously monitor 4
HS-SCCH. There is a one to one mapping between HS
DSCH data sub-frame and HS-SCCH control sub-frame
with a 2-slot delay between the two as shown in Figure 3.
This allows the mobile time to set up for HS-DSCH
demodulation.
15 Timeslots = 10ms
Sub-Frame
3 times lots = 2ms
Figure 3 - HS-DSCH to HS-SCCH association.
HARQ acknowledgements on the HS-DPCCH are
positive (ACK) or negative (NACK). The ACKINACK
message is signaled via different transmitted power levels
relative to the R99 uplink DPCCH. The CQI contains
measurement feedback information used by the Node-B
to select transport format (also called MCS) and resource.
IV. Scheduling and Resource Allocation
Techniques for HSDP A
In HSDPA a scheduling and resource allocation entity is
located at the Node-B, which allows a mixture of services
to be supported by each sector in the system while
maintaining good user experience and maximizing the
number of users supported.
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A scheduler evolves each user's priority metric and sorts
the users based on the metric for each TTl. The derivation
of the priority metric differentiates different types of
schedulers. The scheduler for the HS-DSCH is designed
to satisfy four main goals:
Maximizing system capacity for the target traffic
types,
Maintaining a "level" of fairness to achieve a
required QoS for each user's service.
Provide a time-domain scheduling gam (e.g.
schedule on a constructive fade).
Complement transport protocols (e.g. TCP/IP).
The Modulation and Coding (MCS) selection algorithm is
a part of the resource allocation function. The scheduler
provides a list of prioritized users to the resource
allocation function. The MCS selection algorithm
allocates the minimum power and code resources (i.e.
transmission rate chosen in terms of modulation and
coding) starting with the user at the top of its list and
moves down until resources are exhausted or cannot be
allocated to any other lower ranked users
Joint scheduling and resource allocation schemes try to
achieve optimal resource allocation gain with multiple
users. HSDPA system performance can be significantly
improved with such schemes.
The scheduling and resource allocation algorithms, which
are proprietary in nature, have significantly increased
baseline HSDPA system throughput. The scheduling
algorithm used in this paper is based on the well-known
proportional fair algorithm but enhanced to allow joint
resource allocation and scheduling.
V. HSDPA and R99 UMTS Capacity
In this section, various HSDPA+R99 deployment
scenarios including voice only, data only and mixed
voice+data are simulated (see Table 1). In these
simulations the associated control channels for HSDPA
(DPCH and HS-SCCH) are explicitly modeled and 20%
of the Node-B power is allocated to other overhead
channels. When voice+HSDPA data is simulated, all the
power left over from the common channels and the voice
users is available for HSDP A data users. It may be noted
that the measurement period and measurement latency
associated with the calculation of available power for
HSDPA was not modeled in the simulation. The
simulation assumptions, traffic models and definitions are
given in Appendix. Also for voice+HSDPA data case,
results are presented based on dynamic HSDPA code
allocation where codes are allocated to HSDPA users
from available codes not used by R99/4 users on a frame
by-frame basis.
3360
 Table 1 - Simulation Cases system load is 4x that of WCDMA R99. For the same
offered load (in this case 50 UEs/sector) the overall user
With traffic and
throughput is about 4x higher for HSDPA. Note,
1 1 00% Data using R99 DSCH
and HSDPA
channel model mix however, that WAP or micro-browser user t-put is similar
for HSDPA and R99 WCDMA since they are constrained
1 00% Data using R5
With associated largely by network delays. The data only curve (DO) in
2 HSDP A with HTTP web
dedicated channels Figure 4 shows the performance of HSDPA with a web
browsing with TCP/IP
browsing traffic model (with TCP/lP slow start) using the
Mixed R5 HSDPA + R99 With associated
3 assumptions outlined in the Appendix.
VOICe. dedicated channels

HSDPA Data and R99 data. With associated Table 4 - HSDPA Outage and throughput for Traffic mix
4
using Full Buffer dedicated channels
UEs/sector 75 100 125 150
user-tput 79 66 55 48 Kbps
sector-t ut 1198 1435 1706 1919 Kb s
Case 1: 100% Data using R99 DSCH: outage all 0.007 0.020 0.057 0.092
outage nrtv 0.067 0.146 0.271 0.439
The performance of R99-DSCH for a mixture of traffic outage wap 0 000 0 000 0 000 0.001
models is summarized in Table 2 and Table 3. A round outage web 0.002 0.023 0.089 0.162
outage ftp 0.008 0.022 0.134 0.171
robin scheduler was used for WCDMA R99. Here, the
definition of outage for FTP and HTTP Web Browsing is
Table 5 - HSDPAUser throughput for Traffic mix
that the average user throughput drops below 32Kbps. An
outage indication for Near Real Time Video (NRTV) UEsisector 75 100 125 150
all user-tput 79 66 55 48 Kbps
user, also known as streaming video users, occurs when nrtv user-tput 64 63 59 54 Kbps
more than 2% of packets are late and therefore dropped. Vvap user-put 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.3 Kbps
vveb user-put 222 200 158 133 Kbps
Outage for a WAP user is defined as the average packet ftp user -tput 280 234 174 154 Kbps
throughput dropping below 4800 bps. Generally the sector-tput 1198 1435 1 6 1919 ps

fraction of total users considered in outage is targeted to

be 2% or less. Also aggregate user packet call throughput
is shown except where indicated otherwise. 250

PartiallR + Dynamic OVSF Code Assignment

Table 2 - WCDMA R99 Outage and throughput 200

performance for Traffic mix

UEs/sector
user-tput
8
64
17
52
25
46
33
35
i
'"
150

sector-tput 119 303 390 460

outage all D ODO 0.008 0.026 0.059
:.
=>
100
outage nrtv D ODO 0.050 0.200 0.417
c
m
outage wap D ODO 0 000 D ODO D ODO I

outage web D ODO 0.003 0 013 0.065

50 UoedSector
outage ftp D ODO 0 000 0 000 0.014 50
75
1m
1
Priority: Overhead,Volce, HSDPA
1m

Table 3 - WCDMA R99 User throughput for Traffic mix 500 1000 1500 2000 2500

HSDPA SectorT-put (Kbps)

Figure 4 - HSDPA throughput for different mixes of

voice and data users for a maximum CDM=4 along
with dynamic code allocation.

Case 3:R5 HSDPA and R99 voice mix:

Case 2: 100% R5 HSDPA:
The performance of HSDPA for a mixture of traffic
models is summarized in Table 4 and Table 5. The
mixture is as follows: WAP-55%, FTP-IO%, Web
browsing-25% and Video Streaming - 1O%.
Comparing Table 2/Table 3 to Table 4/Table 5 for a
mixture of traffic (WAP, FTP, NRTV, HTTP) with an
enhanced PF scheduler and channel mix (PA, PB, VA,
Doppler) we find that HSDPA is about 3x better than
WCDMA R99 in terms of sector throughput given similar
outages (which occurs, for example, in the 17 UE/sector
R99 case vs. 75 UE/sector HSDPA case). The systems
achieve the same level of outage when the HSDPA
Figure 4 shows the HSDPA sector and user throughput
for different mixes of R99 voice and HSDPA data users
when using dynamic code assignment and for a maximum
CDM of 4 (i.e. up to four users can be scheduled per sub
frame). The number of Users/Site indicates load (N), the
number of voice users is denoted by V and N-V is the
offered data load where not all the data users are active at
the same time due to the packet call arrival process.
Case 4: HSDPA vs. R99 for Full Buffer traffic model
Figure 5 compares HSDPA user throughput to UMTS
R99 DSCH for a Full Buffer traffic model. As shown,
HSDPA with a Rake receiver can support 10 users with
average user packet call throughput of 320 kbps (or

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 586Kbps for MMSE receiver) while UMTS R99 can
support only 53 kbps. Thus, user throughput of an
HSDPA system increases by 6x compared to UMTS R99
for Full Buffer traffic. With advanced receivers, HSDPA
can support an offered load of 60 broadband users per site
with an average user throughput of approximately 336
kbps. Note that the average packet call throughput of all
packet calls of a sector from all users for HSDPA is 10x
that of UMTS R99 and is equal to 400kbps for an offered
load of 120 users per site (see Fig 6). For web browsing
traffic this statistic is very close to the average user packet
call throughput statistic but deviates for full buffer traffic.
I _FUlibUffer_UMTS _Fulibuffer_HSDPA
700
600
500
WCDMA due to network delay limitations (such as
call setup delay).
5. For the web-browsing with TCPIlP traffic model the
average sector and user throughput for HSDPA is
approximately 2000 kbps and 140 kbps respectively.
6. For the mixed R99 (circuit) voice and HSDPA data
case, a graceful degradation in data performance
occurs as the percentage of voice users in the system
mcreases. The results reflect dynamic code
assignment and maximum CDM=4
7. It may also be observed that even with 45 - 12.2
Fulibuffer_HS_MMSE I kbps voice users the system could achieve a HSDPA
data sector throughput of approximately 600 kbps
with 120 kbps user throughput. Further, with 50
UE's per sector the user throughput remains

approximately the same irrespective of voice load.

400
.r:

300
Cl

VI. Conclusions

200 Physical layer aspects and system performance of

::J HSDPA were presented in this paper. It was shown that
100
an HSDPA system using advanced features like AMC,
HARQ with IR, intelligent scheduling and resource
10 20 30 40 50
UE per Sector allocation can achieve a sector and user throughput of
Figure 5 -User t-put for R99 DSCH VS. HSDPA using
approximately 3x that of a R99 system. For the results
15 codes and Full Buffer traffic model
presented, it can be concluded that HSDPA is 3x more
spectrally efficient than R99 WCDMA and provides WiFi
....... Fulibuffer_UMTS Fulibuffer_HSDPA like speeds and user experience similar to existing
1200

wireline broadband services.

1000
Acknowledgements
.c

:;
Co
800
.r:
Thanks to Ken Stewart, Fan Wang, and Raja Bachu for
e 600
Cl

.r:
I-
their helpful MMSE receiver work regarding HSDPA.
400

Also thanks to Tom Quirke and Brian Moore.
]l
.. 200
---. References
10 20 30 40 50 [1] 3GPP Technical Specification CTS) 25.211, 25.212, 25.213
UE per Sector and 25.214, Version 5.3.0.

Figure 6 Average packet call throughput of all packet

-
[2] D. Chase, "Code combining-A maximum-likelihood de
calls for a given sector for R99 DSCH vs. HSDPA. coding approach for combining an arbitrary number of
noisy packets", IEEE Trans. Comm., Vol. COM-33, No. 5,
Based on the results of Case-I, Case-2 and Case-3 the pp 385-393, May 1985.

following conclusions are drawn: [3] A. Ghosh et aI, "Control Channel Design for HSDPA for
3GPP W-CDMA, Rel-5", Spring VTC-2003.
l . Comparing Table 2/Table 3 to Table 4ITabie 5 for a
mixture of traffic (WAF, FTP, NRTV, HTTP) with [4] A. Ghosh et aI, "Incremental Redundancy Schemes for W
the enhanced PF scheduler and channel mix (PA, CDMA HS-DSCH", PIMRC-2002.
PB, VA, Doppler) we find HSDPA is about 3-4x
[5] R. Love et ai, "Incremental Redundancy for Evolutions of
better than WCDMA R99 in terms of sector 3G CDMA Systems", Spring VTC-2002.
throughput for similar user outages.
[6] R. Love et aI, "HSDPA Performance", Fall VTC-200 l .
2. HSDPA can be loaded with 4 times more users than
[7] A . Ghosh e t ai, "Performance o f Coded Higher Order
WCDMA R99 for the same outage.
Modulation and HARQ for Next Generation Cellular
3. For the same offered load (in this case of 50 CDMA Systems", VTC Fall 2000, pp.500-505.

UEs/sector) the overall user throughput is about 4x [8] R. Love, K. Stewart, R. Bachu, "MMSE Equalization for
higher for HSDPA UMTS HSDPA", Fall VTC 2003.

4. The WAF or micro-browser sector and user

throughput are similar for HSDPA and R99

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 APPENDIX

Table 6 - Simulation Parameters

Cellular layout Hexagonal grid, 19 sites, 3 -sectors

Macro-cell propagation model L= 128. 1+37.610glO(R), 1000m site-to-site

Shadowing Model Log Normal sigma 10.0 dB

ITU Fading Models Cases 1&2: PB, VA, Doppler, PA

PA - Pedestrian A Case 3: PB, VA (50%/50%)
PB - Pedestrian B Case 4: PA, PB, PA (33%/33%/34%)
VA - Vehicular A
Speed Assignment

UE Receiver Type

Carrier Frequency

Node B configuration 3 -sector I carrier

UE HSDPA capability 15 code

Maximum CDM 4 (i.e. at most 4 UEs scheduled per TTl)

Call Setup Delay, rAT 200ms, 2seconds unless stated otherwise

HSDP A Associated DL DPCH Explicitly modeled

HS-SCCH Explicitly modeled

HSDPA Service WEB browsing (inc. TCP slow start), Mixed Traffic

R99 Service 12.2 kb/s + 3.4 kb/s SRB, DTX with SID

HSDPA (R5) scheduler HSDPA: Modified Proportional Fair (a= l , =0.75)

WCDMA R99 Scheduler WCDMA R99: Round Robin

HSDPA Resource Allocation Optimal Algorithm

Common channel power overhead 20% (up to 80% for HS-PDSCH, HS-SCCH, and
associated DL DPCHs)

Table 7 - Traffic model parameters

Parameter WAF HTML FTP NRTV Full

Buffer

I
Main Embedded
Object Object
en

Mean Reading Time (sec) 8 30 180 0.00 1

"d
0

()
Mean objects per packet call 2 I
I 5.64 I I

S Mean Time between objects 1.6 0. 13 0 0

oj
....
E-< Mean Object Size (bytes) 256 10710 I 7758 2000000 2000000

Mean Packet Call Size (bytes) 5 12 54465 2000000 2000000

Offered Load per User (kbps) 0.43 14.4 85. 1 64 Unlimited

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