Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Bachelor Thesis HSDPA CQI Mapping Optimi-84pages
Bachelor Thesis HSDPA CQI Mapping Optimi-84pages
Bachelor Thesis HSDPA CQI Mapping Optimi-84pages
by
I would like to thank all those people who have somehow supported me dur-
ing my work in this Bachelor Thesis and also during all my career in Madrid
and Vienna. First I want to express my gratitude to Professor Markus Rupp
for his supervision and warm wellcome, and also to all the staff of the Insti-
tute who did my time in the university more comfortable.
I want to thank also the friends that I met in Vienna who did my life there
during six months really special and happy and showed their interest in my
work, specially Corinna, Alberto, Cristina and the turkish girls. I thank their
lovely frienship and support.
i
Abstract
In this bachelor thesis, the SISO HSDPA simulator developed for Mobilkom
Austria AG shall be extended in order to handle real network layout data.
The Mobilkom Austria AG will provide measured path-loss matrices of a
HSDPA cluster. This data has to be converted in a suitable form to be
analyzable in the simulator. Furthermore, a memory efficient loading of the
data has to be implemented. Based on this real network data, an optimization
of the CQI mapping of HSDPA mobiles shall be performed in order to find the
mapping which maximizes the overall cell throughput. This mapping can be
used to implement a suitable CQI ”re-mapping” at the Node-B, granting an
optimum HSDPA network performance. The source-code has to be developed
in MATLAB to ensure simple debugging and feature extendability.
ii
Contents
1 Introduction 1
1.1 Third Generation Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.3 Work environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
1.4 Objectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.5 Structure of the thesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2 HSDPA Principles 5
2.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2.2 HSDPA Standardization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.3 HSDPA vs Release 4 DCH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2.3.1 Radio resource management architecture . . . . . . . . 10
2.4 HSDPA operation principle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.5 HSDPA channels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.5.1 HSDPA new channels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.5.2 High-speed dedicated physical control channel . . . . . 20
3 HSDPA Simulator 22
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
3.2 System model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
3.3 Simulation process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
3.3.1 Load settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
3.3.2 Precalculations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
3.3.3 Simulation loop . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
3.3.4 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
iii
5 CQI Mapping Optimizations 45
5.1 CQI Basis in HSDPA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
5.2 CQI mapping proposal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
5.2.1 CQI Table . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
5.3 CQI optimizations in the Simulator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
5.3.1 Source Code Enhancements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
5.3.2 Consequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
5.3.3 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
6 Miscellaneous 59
6.1 New scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
6.2 More efficient implementation of the
pathloss generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
6.3 Further enhancements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
6.3.1 Outage users . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
6.3.2 Throughput figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
7 Conclusions 68
7.1 Simulator enhancement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
7.2 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
7.3 Future enhancements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
iv
List of Figures
1.1 View coverage map about HSDPA deployment in the world, [1]. 2
v
5.2 HS-DSCH link adaptation principle: (1) the UE reports low-
quality channel information and the Node B allocates a low
bit rate; (2) the UE reports high-quality channel information
and the Node B allocates a high bit rate, [2]. . . . . . . . . . . 47
5.3 Block diagram showing the received signal at the HSDPA user
and report of the CQI to the serving HS-DSCH cell, [4]. . . . . 48
5.4 CQI mapping. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
5.5 Coarse view of the simulation including slope and shift. . . . . 54
5.6 Different values of the slope for the CQI mapping. . . . . . . . 55
5.7 Different values of the shift for the CQI mapping. . . . . . . . 55
5.8 Throughput as function of the slope value with shift = 0. . . . 57
5.9 Throughput as function of the shift value with slope = 1. . . . 57
5.10 Throughput as function of the slope and shift. . . . . . . . . . 58
vi
Abbreviations
vii
Max C/I - Maximum Carrier to Interference
MCS - Modulation and Coding Scheme
MIMO - Multiple Input Multiple Output
MS - Mobile Station
PDP - Power Delay Profile
PDU - Protocol Data Unit
PF - Proportional Fair
QoS - Quality of Service
RLC - Radio Link Control
RNC - Radio Network Control
RR - Round Robin
RRM - Radio Resource Management
SAW - Stop And Wait
SF - Spreading Factor
SGSN - Serving GPRS Support Node
SINR - Signal to Noise and Interference Ratio
SISO - Single Input Single Output
SNR - Signal to Noise Ratio
SPI - Scheduling Priority Indicator
TCP - Transmission Control Protocol
TBS - Transport Block Size
TTI - Transmit Time Interval
UE - User Equipment
UMTS - Universal Mobile Telecommunications System
UTRAN - UMTS Terrestrial Radios Access Network
WCDMA - Wideband Code Division Multiple Access
WSS - Widesense Stationary
viii
Chapter 1
Introduction
1.2 Technology
High-Speed Downlink Packet Access, or also known as HSDPA, is a mobile
telephone protocol in the High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA) family of third
generation (3G) technologies designed to reduce the latency of the link and
increase data transfer rates and the capacity of such networks through the
transfer of data using a cellular phone. HSDPA is associated with the vari-
1
ous Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) networks. Cur-
rent HSDPA deployments support down-link speeds of 1.8, 3.6, 7.2 and 14.4
Mbps. The first phase of HSDPA has been specified in the 3rd Generation
Partnership Project (3GPP) Release 5. The second phase of HSDPA is spec-
ified in the 3GPP Release 7 and has been named HSPA Evolved or also
HSPA+; it can achieve data rates of up to 25 Mbps, [1].
Figure 1.1: View coverage map about HSDPA deployment in the world, [1].
2
The source-code is based on MATLAB and it simulates a mixed network in
which both UMTS and HSDPA traffics are present. MATLAB is a high-level
technical computing language and interactive environment for algorithm de-
velopment, data visualization, data analysis, and numeric computation. It is
an extended engineering tool and has enhanced the tradicional languages. It
allows solving technical computing problems and a wide range of applications
like signal and image processing, communications, easy matrix manipulation,
plotting of functions and data, implementation of algorithms, creation of user
interfaces, and interfacing with programs in other languages. The extension
of the initial simulator is also developed in MATLAB, to ensure extendability
and simple debugging.
1.4 Objectives
Let me briefly sketch the motivation of this bachelor thesis. The first goal
of the simulator was to evaluate the HSDPA throughput performance in
the mixed traffic network; and based on this groundwork this thesis should
develop two enhancements, namely:
• Extend the SISO HSDPA Simulator in order to handle real
network layout data: this is the main functionality on which the
work has been focused; the Mobilkom Austria AG provided measured
path-loss matrices of a HSDPA cluster, including parameters like an-
tenna gain patterns, the height of the antennas and the Nodes-B posi-
tions. This data has to be converted in a suitable form to be analyzable
in the simulator.
• CQI mapping optimizations: an optimization of the CQI mapping
of HSDPA mobiles shall be performed in order to find the mapping
which maximizes the overall cell throughput. This optimization can
result in a new mapping at the Node-B that grant an optimum HSDPA
network performance.
3
• Chapter 3: this chapter describes the initial SISO-HSDPA Simulator,
including the system model and simulation process.
• Chapter 4: the conversions of the real data matrices into useful infor-
mation for the simulator, the overall process and necessary new func-
tionalities and modifications in the initial source-code for handling the
new real data layout are explained in this section.
• Chapter 5: this chapter outlines the CQI basis in HSDPA, the current
CQI mapping and the mapping optimizations investigated in the thesis,
as well as the new functions including in the original simulator for this
purpose.
4
Chapter 2
HSDPA Principles
2.1 Introduction
HSDPA, also called 3.5G, is the evolution of the third generation (3G) and
is considered the previous step before the fourth generation (4G), the future
High-Speed Mobile Network. HSDPA and High-Speed Uplink Packet Access
(HSUPA) are the components of the High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA) fam-
ily. HSPA is an upgrade of the network infrastructure and it is part of the
WCDMA 3G network. As an enhancement of UMTS, HSDPA was designed
to improve the quality of service, increase the peak data rates (currently
speeds supported by HSDPA are 1.8, 3.6, 7.2 and 14.4 Mbps). Also com-
pared to UMTS, the spectral efficiency is significantly increased, and this
allows more users being able to use high data rates on a single carrier. The
fundamental techniques used in HSDPA to achieve this improvements are
Adaptive Modulation and Coding (AMC), extensive multi-code operation
and a fast and spectrally efficient retransmission strategy. The assignment of
the HS-DSCH (High-Speed Downlink Shared Channel) among the users on
5
a TTI basis (1 TTI = 2 ms) is coordinated by a fast scheduler. Higher cell
capacity and higher spectral efficiency are required to provide these higher
data rates and new services with the current base station sites. Figure 2.1
illustrates the estimated cell capacity per sector per 5MHz with WCDMA,
with basic HSPA and with enhanced HSPA in the macro-cell environment.
6
HSDPA data rates supported are shown in Table 2.1.
Table 2.1: Current HSDPA commercial networks and data rates, [1].
7
HSPA is deployed on top of the WCDMA network. Both of them can share
all the network elements in the core network and in the radio network includ-
ing base stations, Radio Network Controller (RNC), Serving GPRS Support
Node (SGSN) and Gateway GPRS Support Node (GGSN). WCDMA and
HSPA are also sharing the base station sites, antennas and antenna lines.
3GPP creates the technical content of the specifications, based around work
items, though small changes can be introduced directly as ”change requests”
against specification, but it is the organizational partners that actually pub-
lish the work. In addition to the organizational partners, there are also
market representation partners, such as the UMTS Forum, part of 3GPP.
With bigger items a feasibility study is done usually before rushing in to
making actual changes to the specifications, [2].
A feasibility study for HSDPA was started in March 2000 in line with 3GPP
principles, having at least four supporting companies. Motorola and Nokia
supporting the start of the work from the vendor side and BT/Cellnet, T-
Mobile and NTT DoCoMo from the operator side. The study was finalized
for the TSG RAN plenary for March 2001 and there were issues studied to
improve the downlink packet data transmission over Release 4 specifications.
Physical layer retransmissions and BTS-based scheduling were studied as well
as adaptive coding and modulation. The study also included some investiga-
tions for multi-antenna transmission and reception technology, titled MIMO
(Multiple Input Multiple Output), and also Fast Cell Selection (FCS), [2].
The Release 4 based DCH is the key part of the system, and Release 5
8
HSDPA is always operated with the DCH running in parallel. If the service
is only for packet data, then at least the signalling radio bearer (SRB) is
carried on the DCH.
In case the service is circuit-switched, then the service always runs on the
DCH. In Release 5, uplink user data always go on the DCH (when HSDPA is
active), whereas in Release 6 an alternative is provided by the Enhanced DCH
(E-DCH) with the introduction of high-speed uplink packet access (HSUPA).
In the case of multiple services, the reserved capacity is the sum of the peak
data rate of the services. The main functionality for the DCH is the fast
power control in addition to encoding the data packet provided by the RNC.
Furthermore, soft handover is supported for the DCH. As a difference with
Release 4, HSDPA introduces some methods for improving downlink packet
data in terms of capacity and bit rates. The key differences between the
HS-DSCH (HSDPA dedicated channel) and the Release 4 DCH-based packet
data operation are as follows:
• Lack of fast power control. Instead, link adaptation selects the suitable
combination of codes, coding rates and modulation to be used.
• User allocation with base station based scheduling every 2ms, including
fast physical layer signalling. With DCH the higher layer signalling
from the RNC allocates semi-permanent code (and a spreading factor)
to be used. The transmission time interval (TTI) is also longer with
the DCH, allowing values such as 10, 20, 40 or 80 ms. (The longest is
limited in the specific case of small data rates that have a spreading
factor of 512).
• Lack of soft handover. Data are sent from one serving HS-DSCH cell
only.
9
• Multicode operation with a fixed spreading factor. Only spreading
factor 16 is used, while with the DCH the spreading factor could be a
static parameter between 4 and 512.
10
dedicated channels (DCHs) and the one actually being connected to the base
transceiver station (BTS) would handle the common channels.
Due to the BTS based scheduling, the overall RRM architecture changed.
The SRNC will still retain control of handovers and is the one which will
decide the suitable mapping for quality of service (QoS) parameters. With
HSDPA the situation is simplified because, as there are no soft handovers for
HSDPA data, the utilization of the Iur interface can be avoided by perform-
ing SRNC relocation, when the serving high-speed downlink shared channel
(HS-DSCH) cell is under a different controlling RNC (CRNC). Thus, just a
single RNC could be enough for the typical HSDPA scenario, [2]. Figure 2.4
shows the new RRM architecture.
11
layer feedback received in the uplink. Scheduling and link adaptation are
then conducted on a fast pace depending on the scheduling algorithm and
the user prioritization scheme. The general HSDPA operation principle is
shown in Figure 2.5.
12
2.5 HSDPA channels
2.5.1 HSDPA new channels
Several new channels have been introduced for HSDPA operation. For user
data there is the high-speed downlink shared channel (HS-DSCH) and the
corresponding physical channel. For the associated signalling needs there are
two channels: high-speed dedicated physical control channel (HS-DPCCH)
in the uplink direction and high-speed shared control channel (HS-SCCH)
in the downlink. In addition to the basic HSDPA channel covered in Re-
lease 5 specifications, there is now a new channel in Release 6 specifications -
the fractional dedicated physical channel (F-DPCH) - to cover for operation
when all downlink traffic is carried on the HS-DSCH. The channels needed
for HSDPA operation are shown in Figure 2.6.
13
downlink shared channel (HS-PDSCH).
The channel coding is simpler than the corresponding DCH one, be-
cause in the HS-DSCH there is no need to deal with DTX or compressed
mode, and there is only one transport channel active at a time because
fewer steps in multiplexing/de-multiplexing are needed. The HS-DSCH
channel coding chain is illustrated in Figure 2.7.
– 16QAM :
While the DCH only uses 4QAM modulation, the HS-DSCH may
additionally use the higher order modulation 16QAM. HS-DSCH
incorporates this modulation to increase the peak data rates for
users served under favourable radio conditions. Support of 4QAM
is mandatory for the mobile, despite the support of 16QAM is op-
tional for the network and the UE. The inclusion of this high
order modulation introduces some complexity challenges for the
receiver terminal, which needs to estimate the relative amplitude
of the received symbols, whereas it only requires the detection of
14
Figure 2.7: HS-DSCH channel coding chain, [3].
the signal phase in the 4QAM case. The turbo encoder is in charge
of the data protection. The 16QAM constellation rearrangement
depends on the transmission number, because the symbols in the
constellation do not have the same error probability. The 16QAM
and 4QAM constellations are shown in Figure 2.8.
15
QAM is a digital modulation that transports data by changing
the amplitude of two carrier signals. These two waves, generally
sinusoidal, are in the same frecuency but with a phase difference
of ninety degrees; both signal paths - I and Q - carry information.
It is used for the data transmission with a high speed by channels
with restricted bandwidth. By having more constellation points -
16 instead of 4 - now 4 bits can be carried per symbol instead of
2 bits per symbol with 4QAM.
– Bit scrambling:
16
– HS-DSCH Link Adaptation
Using link adaptation, the network will also gain from the lim-
itation of power control dynamics in the downlink. As signals
in the downlink cannot use a too large dynamic range to avoid
the near-far problem between signals from the same source, the
downlink power control dynamics is also limited. While in the up-
link a 71-dB or more dynamic range is used, in the downlink only
around 10 to 15 dBs can be utilized. The exact number depends
on the implementation, channel environment and spreading fac-
tors applied. This means that for users close to the base station
the power level transmitted is higher than necessary for reliable
signal detection. Using link adaptation, there is a difference of a
few decibels in the signal strength, just by changing from 4QAM
to 16QAM; and by playing with the coding rates and the number
of codes the total dynamic range can reach 30 dB.
• Hybrid ARQ :
17
two Hybrid ARQ strategies are: (1) identical retransmissions (also
called soft combining) or (2) non-identical retransmissions (or so-called
’incremental redundancy’). The Hybrid ARQ technique is fundamen-
tally different from the WCDMA retransmissions because the UE de-
coder combines the soft information of multiple transmissions of a
transport block at bit level. Let us go a little bit more into detail:
If due to a signalling error that could fill the buffer with undesired
data, due to a low coverage, or due to a change of the serving HS-
DSCH cell, the number of physical layer retransmissions exceeds the
maximum or the retransmissions fail, the radio link layer will handle
further retransmissions.
18
per slot to be carried (with 4QAM modulation). The phase reference does
not change when using HS-DSCH due to the lack of pilots or power control
bits on the HS-SCCH.
The timing between the HS-SCCH and the HS-DSCH allows the terminal
to have one slot time to receive the information which codes have to de-
spread and with which to modulate. For the remaining parameters, a slot
processing time is needed before a new 2-ms TTI starts.
19
When HSDPA is operated using the time multiplexing principle, then only
one HS- SCCH can be configured. In this case only one user receives data at
a time. When there is code multiplexing, then more than one HS-SCCH is
needed. A single terminal may consider at most four HS-SCCHs; the system
itself could configure even more. The use of code multi-plexing is not nec-
essarily needed either when the carrier is shared with DCH traffic, or when
there is a desire to have HSDPA data users operating with reasonable data
rates -in the order of 384 kbps or more. In general, the data rate available
for each user in different cases will depend on power allocation, the environ-
ment and the type of terminal being used. The channel coding is one-third
convolutional coding (as turbo-coding does not make sense with such a small
amount of information). In the second part there is a cyclic redundancy
check (CRC) to make sure that there is no corruption of the information. A
signalling error with, say, an HARQ process number would cause problems
as it would cause buffer corruption; thus, a 16-bit CRC is used to ensure
sufficient reliability, [2].
According to [8], the RNC may set the maximum transmission power on
all the codes of the HS-DSCH and HS-SCCH channels in the cell. Likewise,
the RNC determines the maximum number of channelization codes to be
used by the HS-DSCH channel.
By keeping the existing uplink DPCCH and DPDCH unchanged the ac-
tive set can also accommodate Release 4 based base stations. The initial
uplink DPCCH transmit power is set by higher layers. Subsequently the up-
link transmit power control procedure simultaneously controls the power of a
DPCCH and its corresponding DPDCHs (if present). The relative transmit
power offset between DPCCH and DPDCHs is determined by the network.
Any change in the uplink DPCCH transmit power shall take place immedi-
ately before the start of the pilot field on the DPCCH. The change in DPCCH
20
power with respect to its previous value is derived by the UE. The previous
value of DPCCH power shall be that used in the previous slot, except in the
event of an interruption in transmission due to the use of compressed mode,
when the previous value shall be that used in the last slot before the trans-
mission gap. During the operation of the uplink power control procedure the
UE transmit power shall not exceed a maximum allowed value which is the
lower out of the maximum output power of the terminal power class and a
value which may be set by higher layer signalling. Uplink power control shall
be performed while the UE transmit power is below the maximum allowed
output power, [9].
Fractional DPCCH
For Release 6, further optimization took place for the situation where only
packet services are active in the downlink other than the signalling radio
bearer (SRB). In such a case, especially with lower data rates, the downlink
DCH introduces too much overhead and can also consume too much code
space if looking for a large number of users using a low data rate service (like
VoIP). The solution was to use an F-DPCH, which is basically a stripped-
down version of DPCH that handles the power control.
The code resource is time-shared, thus several users can share the same code
space for power control information. Each user sees only the channel which
has one symbol per slot for transmission power control (TPC) information
and assumes there is no transmission in the rest of the symbols. With several
users, the network configures each user having the same code but different
frame timing and, thus, users can be transmitted on the single code source.
Up to ten users can share one SF 256 code, thus reducing code space uti-
lization for the associated DCH for users with all services mapped to the
HS-DSCH,[2].
21
Chapter 3
HSDPA Simulator
In this chapter the initial simulator on which this bachelor thesis is based
and all the work that was developed is explained. It contains the information
about the initial simulator created by M.Wrulich, et al., in which I had to
implement some new functionalities for the enhancement of the simulator.
The chapter is organized as follows: Section 3.1 briefly sketchs the purpose
and context of the simulator; a short description of the system-level model
for the investigation is included in Section 3.2 and Section 3.3 explains the
structure of the simulator.
3.1 Introduction
Let me briefly introduce the work environment and goals of the initial SISO
HSDPA Simulator. In the program, written in MATLAB, a mixed UMTS
and HSDPA network is simulated. As described in Chapter 2, one of the
advantages in a WCDMA network is that HSDPA can coexist within an
existing 5MHz band of Release 4, allowing for sharing the power amplifier
and spreading codes at the Node-B between the HS-DSCH and the Release-
4 dedicated channels. Even if HSDPA is widely installed, a mixed carrier
operation is more cost-efficient for cells that are not fully loaded, [10]. One
of the goals of the initial simulator was to deduce the optimum Node-B
power split within the mixed scenario, by means of snapshot based network
simulations, in order to maximize the overall cell throughput. The obtained
results can be used for the cell operation planning by the network operators.
22
3.2 System model
According to [10], the HSDPA performance is done with a system-level si-
mulator in which the following aspects are modelled:
23
– The base station is allowed to allocate all unused power for HS-
DPA, instead of sending NBAP messages.
Pother incorporates the power from the common pilot channel and other
needed common channels. This explains the fact that the total intra-
cell power depends on the DCH and HSDPA transmission power.
• Load settings: before starting the process, the function ”load settings”
is called. This settings file allows for the specification of the simulation,
i.e. the kind of network, channel and user equipment.
• Precalculations: after the settings are loaded and before the simula-
tion starts, there are some precalculations which allow us creating some
necessary elements like user and Node-B positions, all the pathlosses
for every users and PDP for serving links.
• Simulation loop: the last step is the simulation loop, which calcu-
lates different average data rates by means of multiple independent
snapshots.
24
Figure 3.1: Three main steps in the simulator: load settings, precalcula-
tions (i.e Node-B and users positions in order to prepare the network) and
simulation loop to obtain the HSDPA data rate.
– R’99: contains the needed parameteres for Release ’99, like the
bandwith (5 MHz), the chiprate, the UMTS load in percent and
the UMTS required Eb/No for the requested UMTS DCH bearer.
– Node-B: here, some variables like the distance between Node-Bs,
the power level of each Node-B (the maximum power, the CPICH
power and the common power), and the power distribution of the
Node-B are specified.
– Power distribution: determines the power distribution among
the neighboring Node-Bs, thus specifying the intercell-interference
structure.
– HSDPA: in this part the HSDPA network is specified, thus the
number of HSDPA users, the spreading factor of HSDPA trans-
missions (fixed at 16), the number of codes, the absolute HSDPA
25
power and the TTI value (usually 2 ms) are assigned.
– MAC-hs: this is used in an enhanced version of the simulator for
scheduling variables.
– Other: variables like the grid density, which determines the num-
ber of grid points for user positioning within the cell, the G factor
of the network or the other cells interferences are chosen here.
– Network structure: the number of base stations (7 or 19), the
number of sectors for each base station (1 or 3) and the antenna
gain pattern are specified.
– General: the user category class and different noise powers seen
in the receiver, like the receiver noise figure or the thermal noise
density are defined.
– Movement: contains the setting for speed of the user.
– Receiver: the reciver type is specified, and in case of a Rake
receiver the number of fingers is also determined.
– Traffic: will be used in further developements of the simulator.
26
– Simulation type: the kind of simulation can be chosen here. It
is possible to simulate all the possible users positions (also called
grid positions) uniformly, or it can be done by means of multiple
simulations based on multiple snapshot, in which we simulate as
many positions as number of users we have set.
– Link performance model: the COST290 model, where a simple
link performance model based on cost 290 or no model can be used,
but a model is needed to performance the link and simulate a real
situation with a BLER value different to zero.
– R’99 datarate model: a simple data rate model described in
[10].
– Power distribution: settings for the step-size of the power loop
in the simulator.
– Display/save results: backup options.
3.3.2 Precalculations
As already said, when the parameters which determine the kind of simulation
and the variables are loaded, some precalculations have to be done to prepare
the network before the simulation loop starts. The Node-B positions, user
positions, PDP for links in serving site, and the pathlosses for every users are
created here. Some of these calculations have been enhanced in the improved
version of the simulator developed in this thesis.
1. Node-B positions: the network consists of one central hexagonal
cell and six or eighteen hexagons more around it, depending on the
desired number of interfering Node-Bs. The base stations are situated
in the center of each hexagon, and the serving Node-B is in the central
hexagon, so it is in the middle of the network. This configuration is
described as cellular layout 2 in [12]. Both configurations are shown in
Figure 3.2.
2. Users positions: the simulator determines the users postions by using
a grid of points inside the main sector (it is considered the first sector
in the serving node), as we can see in Figure 3.3. We can observe in
this figure that some part in the bottom of the sector is missing. It
corresponds to a 10 square meters area around the base station which
is considered as a limit where no users are positioned.
The users are positioned randomly in the grid positions. The number of
grid points and users is detetermined in the HSDPA traffic simulation
settings. This is shown in Figure 3.4.
27
Figure 3.2: Network layout with 7 and 19 base stations.
Figure 3.3: Example of the grid positions generation in the serving cell.
28
Figure 3.4: Example of the users position in the serving cell.
4. Users pathloss: in this part, the pathlosses from all Node-Bs in the
simulated network structure to the given users are generated. As briefly
explained in the channel modeling and channel settings, the radio prop-
agation model used in the simulator considers three different elements:
macro-scale pathloss, shadow fading, and small-scale fading with mul-
tiple paths and no correlation in time, since this initial simulator is
snapshot based with no correlations in between, [10]. The channel co-
efficient which models the radio propragation between the base station
and the user equipment can thus be written as:
L
X √
h(τ ) = d · s · pl · fl · δ(τ − τl ) (3.2)
t=1
29
5. Noise power: settings needed to evaluate the noise power level.
Let us now go a little bit into detail onto the HSDPA system-level
modeling.
30
1. SINR:
PHS−DSCH
NF SF · · |hi |2
X γ
SIN Ru = (3.3)
i=1
Pintra,residual + Pinter + Pnoise
31
2. SINR to CQI:
The next step in the simulator is to calculate the CQI value for a
given SINR. This is done via a linear mapping, i.e.
0,
SIN R ≤ −3.5
CQI = SIN R[dB] + 3.5, −3.5 < SIN R < 26.5 (3.4)
30, SIN R ≥ 26.5
The CQI values (ranging from 0 to 30) are used by the link adap-
tation algorithm at the Node-B. Each value represents a specific
combination of the transport block size (TBS), the number of
codes and the modulation type. Thus, each value indicates the
maximum TBS that can be correctly received with 90% probabi-
lity.
3. CQI to TBS:
4. BLER:
32
2 SIN
√R−1.03CQI+5.26 −1
BLER = [10 3−log10 (CQI)
+ 1] 0.7 (3.5)
After all the steps done in the simulation, the HSDPA user data
rate can be calculated. It is important to note that the TBS de-
notes the maximum amount of data that can be transmitted via
the network in one TTI of 2 ms to the UE without exceeding a
BLER of 0.1 in average, and accordingly the HSDPA user data
rate is calculated with Equation 3.6,
1
Ru = T BS · · (1 − BLER) (3.6)
2ms
• Release 4:
3.3.4 Results
A short description of the simulation results concludes the inicial simulator
explanation. The investigation identifies the optimun power setting in order
to maximize the total cell throughput.
33
Figure 3.6 shows the achievable average cell throughput on DCH and HS-
DPA, and the total cell throughput (the sum of the throughput on DCH and
HSDPA) versus the amount of power that is allocated for HSDPA traffic.
The simulation parameters are as follows: Release 4 load of 20%, Node-B
distance of 0.5 km, Pedestrian A model, 10 codes used for HS-DSCH and the
user category 6. The HSDPA cell throughput increases when more power
is allocated to HSDPA, while the DCH throughput decreases as there will
be less power for the transmission of these channels. It is observed that the
HSDPA power allocation that maximizes the total cell throughput is around
4 W, which results in the total cell throughput of 735 kbps, with around
600 kbps being carried on HSDPA with PHS−DSCH = 6.078 W. Note that
the HSDPA user data rate starts softly decreasing when the power reaches 6
W because an increase in power results also in an increment of the intercell
interference. The R’99 cell data rate is always decreasing, due to the contin-
uous increasing interference seen by the transmissions.
Figure 3.6: Average data rates with RNC power control of the HS-DSCH.
34
In practice, the optimal HSDPA power setting also depends on the offered
traffic in the cell and the mixture of DCH- and HSDPA-capable UEs. The
gain in the cell throughput from introducing HSDPA mainly comes from a
higher spectral efficiency for the HS-DSCH over the DCH by using Hybrid
ARQ and adaptive modulation and coding, multiuser diversity gain from
using fast PF scheduling, and better utilization of the available cell trans-
mission power. Further information about the optimizations can be found in
[10].
35
Chapter 4
One of the main goals of the work was to extend the SISO HSDPA Simulator
in order to handle real network layout data that the Mobilkom Austria AG
provided by means of measured pathloss matrices of a HSDPA cluster, and
parameters like the height of the antennas and the Nodes-B positions. It
was necessary to convert this data in a useful form to be analyzable in the
simulator. Furthermore, the source-code was enabled to use the data files
after the necessary modifications. The conversion of the real data matrices
into suitable information for the simulator, the overall process and necessary
new functionalities and modifications in the initial source-code for handling
the new real data layout are described in this chapter.
4.1 Introduction
This chapter leads with the use of geographical information in mobile ra-
dio communications from a propagation perspective. Some interest in the
COST231 project has focused on the types, resolution and accuracy of digi-
tal terrain databases required for propagation modelling. Despite it is not
possible in this thesis to list the contents of the files (the accurate location,
tilt and azimuth values of the antennas) since this is confidential informa-
tion, a brief description from [17] about acquisition of geographical data is
depicted below.
36
[18].
37
4.2 Files structure and information
The package provided by Mobilkom AG consists on twelve ”prediction files”;
each one corresponding to a specific Base Station situated in the city center
of Vienna. All of them represent a map of a central area of the city, with the
respective Node-B situated in the center, and the generated pathloss around
it for different distances.
The files are divided in header and pathlosses values. Each value of the
pathloss that is read in the file corresponds to a pixel in the map. Establish-
ing this correspondence is possible by using the information in the header of
the files, since Mobilkom AG also provided the necessary information to man-
age it, such as the lenght in bytes of all the interesting parameters. Figure
4.1 shows the useful information that we can extract from the header.
By using this information we are able to include the real pathloss in the
simulator as well as the Node-B position, grid position and users positions ac-
cordingly to the extracted parameters. Besides the mentioned files, there are
two files more including information about the base stations identifier and
streets where are situated, and the antennas identification (class, tilt, azi-
muth and power). These files are not used so far in the simulation, although
38
it is possible to read them and extract information by means of specific func-
tions that can be enabled in the load settings.
Once we have read all the information, we are able to represent the real
pathloss extracted from the files. Figure 4.2 shows the read pathloss values
from one of the prediction files. This figure gives an idea about the kind of
information attached in the files. By using the new implemented functions,
we are able to convert ASCII data into suitable information that we can plot.
The figure represents the variation of the pathloss with the distance in the
city of Vienna, with the Base Station located in the center of the map. As
observed with the different colors in the figure, in the surroundings of the
Base Station the pathloss is low and increasing with the distance.
Figure 4.2: Read pathloss from data files given by Mobilkom AG.
39
which involves both functionalities (handling real data layout or theorical
pathloss calculation), the structure of the initial MATLAB code has been
kept. Besides some necessary new functions, the functionalities already ex-
isting but adapted for the new purpose have been integrated in the original
source code. Thus, the simulation mode can easily be chosen just by setting
the according variable at the beginning. Let us now list the main steps of
the initial procedures of the simulator:
1. Reading data: as mentioned before, the option for reading the data
files can be enabled in the load settings function. In such case, the
function xf read out data works on the prediction files and extracts the
header of the files, with the information before explained, and the in-
formation about the pathloss. In the case that reading also the two left
files is desirable, this function calls also read bts csv and read site csv
in order to extract their respective information.
2. Node-B positions: following the same process than the initial sim-
ulator, the function which locates the Node-Bs is called first. In this
function, the base stations are situated accordingly to the stored in-
formation extracted from the pedestrian files, or it can be done in the
original way (hexagonal layout). Figure 4.3 shows the positions of the
twelve Node-Bs belong to the twelve prediction files. Notice that some
coordenates are taken by two stations; this is because the position is
the same but not the height.
40
Figure 4.3: Node-Bs positions and respective prediction files.
5. Find main BS and sector: once we have the pathloss matrix, the
next step is to find the main sector and Node-B, which means the Node-
B and sector where the lowest pathloss occured (within the region of
41
interest), and that way we can set a Node-B and pathloss information
for the simulation process.
For this purpose, there is a function which reads the value of every
position in the 3D-matrix, and extracts for every pixel which one of
the twelve files (Nodes-B) and sector generates the minimum pathloss.
This information is kept in a new matrix and then we read every po-
sition of it and we count which Node-B and sector is repeated more
times in that matrix (these will be the main BS and sector for the
simulation).
6. Generate final grid positions: this step fixes the grid positions that
can be generated. The new grid consists of those positions of the pro-
visional grid, where the lowest pathloss was generated by the main BS
(target sector) simultaneously.
Figure 4.4 shows the situation so far, where the provisional grid in
blue, the main Node-B and sector and finally the definitive grid in
green (which defines the sector shape) are illustrated.
7. Generate users positions: this is the last step in the new simulation
process. The final goal of the process is setting up a complete network
42
suitable for simulation. Once the grid positions are defined, users are
located randomly (uniformly) using the same functions as utilized in
the initial version. An example in which a zoom of the previous figure
after the users are generated (plotted in black) is shown in Figure 4.5.
Figure 4.5: Last step: user positions located randomly and uniformly within
the limits of the generated sector (green points).
For a better visualization, Figure 4.6 shows a general overview of the network
setting process when the real data layouts are handled, summarizing the steps
before explained in a diagram.
43
Figure 4.6: Diagram of the overall handling real layouts data process.
44
Chapter 5
This chapter explains more deeply the CQI mapping in HSDPA performance.
Section 5.1 includes an introduction and the CQI basis. In Section 5.2 the
mapping proposal by the 3GPP specifications is explained, and Section 5.3
describes the enhancements in the SISO HSDPA Simulator, where the object
of this part of the work and the achieved results are explained.
45
The HS-DPCCH carries uplink feedback signalling related to the downlink
HS-DSCH transmission. This signalling consists of HARQ-ACK and CQI as
shown in Figure 5.1. Each 2-ms subframe, like those of the downlink physi-
cal channels, consists of three slots, each with 2560 chips. The HARQ-ACK
is carried in the first slot of the HS-DPCCH subframe and the CQI in the
second and third slots. A system parameter k controls the CQI transmission
frequency, and also control repetition for both slots is controlled by a sep-
arate parameter. Repetition over multiple 2-ms periods is needed in some
cases, like cell edge operation when the available power would not ensure
sufficient quality for feedback reception, [2].
Figure 5.1: High-Speed Dedicated Physical Control Channel that carries the
uplink.
Furthermore, we can explain some cases in which the CQI is used for the
performance of HSDPA, say:
• Link adaptation: as already said, the CQI is used for the dynamic
HS-DSCH link adaptation, in addition to the scheduling decision. The
user equipment sends every 2-ms TTI a CQI to the serving HS-DSCH
cell on the uplink HS-DPCCH. By means of the CQI, the maximum
46
TBS that can be received correctly with at least 90% probability is
indicated. The range of CQI values is 0-30, and each step corresponds
appoximately to a 1-dB step in HS-DSCH SINR, [9]. The HS-DSCH
link adaptation algorithm at the Node B adjusts the transmit bit rate
on the HS-DSCH every TTI when a user is scheduled for transmission.
Ideally, the HS-DSCH transmit bit rate should be adjusted as a function
of the per-TTI HS-DSCH signal-to-interference plus noise ratio (SINR)
experienced at the user end. Figure 5.2 illustrates the general principle
HS-DSCH link adaptation, [2].
Figure 5.2: HS-DSCH link adaptation principle: (1) the UE reports low-
quality channel information and the Node B allocates a low bit rate; (2) the
UE reports high-quality channel information and the Node B allocates a high
bit rate, [2].
47
HS-DSCH transmission does not necessarily guarantee that the BLEP
is lower than 0.1, [4].
Figure 5.3: Block diagram showing the received signal at the HSDPA user
and report of the CQI to the serving HS-DSCH cell, [4].
A simple link adaptation algorithm would directly follow the CQI values
reported by the UE, but there may be a need to adjust the UE-reported
CQI by adding an offset because the HS-DSCH transmit power from
the Node B to the user might be different from the assumed HS-DSCH
transmit power by the UE at the time it derived the CQI report; be-
sides, the UE assumes a received HS-PDSCH power level PHS−P DSCH
derived from the observed P/S-CPICH power level PCP ICH according
to PHS−P DSCH = PCP ICH + G, where G is a power offset parameter
signalled to the UE via RRC signalling from the RNC. The effect of
feedback delays on link adaptation performance has previously been ad-
dressed in [21], [22]. In order to further adjust the CQI index received
from a user before applying it for adjustment of the HS-DSCH transmis-
sion format, these studies indicate a need for an outer loop HS-DSCH
link adaptation algorithm, which can be based on ACKs/NACKs from
past transmissions. The algorithm adjusts the offset values to ascer-
tain the average targetted retransmission probability. If too many re-
transmissions occur, an unnecessary delay is added, whereas too few
48
retransmissions indicate that the transport block sizes used are not
large enough, unnecessarily lowering throughput, [2].
• HS-SCCH power control: sufficient power should be allocated to trans-
mission of the HS-SCCH to ensure reliable reception quality of the HS-
SCCH, which is important since the transport block on the HS-DSCH
can only be decoded if the HS-SCCH has been correctly received. Fur-
thermore, reduce HS-SCCH transmission power is also desirable, in
order to decrease the interference levels in the network. Hence, it is
generally recommended to control the HS-SCCH power every TTI. The
3GPP specifications do not explicitly specify any power control mecha-
nism for the HS-SCCH. The HS-SCCH transmit power can be adjusted
relative to the transmit power of the associated downlink DPCCH, or
as a function of the CQI report received from the user. This is possible
if there is an internal table at the Node B expressing a power offset be-
tween each CQI index and the required HS-SCCH power. In both cases
it is possible to implement a pseudo closed loop power control scheme
for the HS-SCCH, relying on either feedback information from the user
about the reception quality of the associated DPCH or the HS-DSCH
(CQI). Common to both approaches is the Node B need for a priori
knowledge of a power offset parameter before it can adjust HS-SCCH
transmit power as a function of either DPCCH power or CQI.
in the 2-ms interval that ends one slot before the CQI is sent, where BLEP is
the per-TTI block error probability. Note that the CQI index in (5.2) depends
49
on the experienced HS-DSCH user SINR since the BLEP for different values
of An depends on the SINR. The received CQI index n is adjusted by the
scaling factor A, so CQI index n̂ is used instead. The latter one is possible by
assuming that the Node-B has a table with a priori knowledge of the relative
HS-DSCH SINR difference in decibels between the entries in the CQI table,
which is denoted by fSIN R (n). Note that the CQI tables have the following
approximate property: fSIN R (n) ≃ 1·n dB ∀ n ǫ [0−30], i.e., the resolution of
the CQI mapping table is approximately 1 dB. Given this a priori knowledge
and scaling factor A, the used CQI index for HS-DSCH link adaptation is
obtained as follows, [4]
n̂ = arg min {fSIN R (n̂) − (fSIN R (n) − An )} (5.3)
n̂
50
CQI value Transport Block Size Nr of HS-PDSCH Modulation
0 N/A 4QAM
1 137 1 4QAM
2 173 1 4QAM
3 233 1 4QAM
4 317 1 4QAM
5 377 1 4QAM
6 461 1 4QAM
7 650 2 4QAM
8 792 2 4QAM
9 931 2 4QAM
10 1262 3 4QAM
11 1483 3 4QAM
12 1742 3 4QAM
13 2279 4 4QAM
14 2583 4 4QAM
15 3319 5 4QAM
16 3565 5 16QAM
17 4189 5 16QAM
18 4664 5 16QAM
19 5287 5 16QAM
20 5887 5 16QAM
21 6554 5 16QAM
22 7168 5 16QAM
23 7168 5 16QAM
24 7168 5 16QAM
25 7168 5 16QAM
26 7168 5 16QAM
27 7168 5 16QAM
28 7168 5 16QAM
29 7168 5 16QAM
30 7168 5 16QAM
The CQI mapping is a very important issue for the optimization of the net-
work and HSDPA performace. A poorly implemented CQI algorithm on one
model of UE can have a significant adverse impact on the efficient allocation
51
of network resources, which will affect all other UEs on the network. When
the terminal is close to the base station and assumes high HS-DSCH power
allocation (based on the value given by the network), a high CQI value is
reported. Respectively, when the terminal is closer to the cell edge, then
the reported CQI is much lower, especially if the expected HSDPA Node-B
power allocation is low as well, [2].
The initial formula for the mapping used previously in the Simulator al-
ready explained, has been modified. For the purpose of achieving the new
mapping and visualization, we represent the CQI values as function of the
SINR, and the possible modifications in the original formula are:
• Shift: the shift value is used like an offset, indicating in which value
of the SINR the CQI starts to have values different to cero. As in the
case of the slope, the selection of this offset is also important for the
optimization.
where the SINR (in dB), the slope and the shift are inputs of the func-
tion and the output is the CQI value. The slope and shift values are chosen
in the loading settings, and also a range of values is possible, in order to
evaluate the different results. Note that the CQI values under 0 and over 30
are mapping like 0 and 30 respectively. Figure 5.4 illustrates an example in
which two possibilities are shown.
52
Figure 5.4: CQI mapping.
the overall cell throughput by changing the slope and shift have been imple-
mented.
Figure 5.5 illustrates a coarse view of the simulation process in which the
new functionalities have been included. The first step is to load the sim-
ulator settings, where it is possible to fix the range of values for the slope
and shift we want to make the simulation with. These variables are found in
the UE settings. Second, the precalculations are done by means of the main
function. Then the simulation loop starts with a determined value of the
slope and the shift, the function for the SINR to CQI mapping is called and
all the calculations are done, so finally there is a throughput value for those
shift and slope values. The simulation is done once again and it lasts while
the range of values is not finished. At the end of the process the throughput
as function of the slope and shift is achieved and represented in a figure.
5.3.2 Consequences
For the purpose of the optimization of the network and HSDPA performace,
the CQI needs to be mapped in the most efficient way. In the model of the
UE, the implementation of a poorly CQI algorithm can result in an impor-
53
Figure 5.5: Coarse view of the simulation including slope and shift.
54
Figure 5.6: Different values of the slope for the CQI mapping.
Figure 5.7: Different values of the shift for the CQI mapping.
In Figure 5.7 the effect of two extreme shift values is illustrated. As before,
the choice is important for the mapping optimization and the consequences
55
are the same. A too low shift value results in users with a low SINR getting
CQI values different to zero, when it is impossible they receive any through-
put because of the low signal quality; and respectively if the shift value is
too high, the users need to have also high SINR values to get a good channel
quality indicator, this leads in the situation that user equipments with good
signal qualities are loosing their capacity to obtain a good service.
5.3.3 Results
Once the source code had been enhanced and adapted for the new CQI map-
ping, and the necessary functions were implemented, we may start with the
investigations for the optimization of the final throughput. First of all it was
necessary to find the optimum range of values for the slope and shift in which
we can achieve high values of the throughput, and once the two ranges are
found, we have to find the optimum values.
Figures 5.8 and 5.9 illustrate two first evaluations of the effect that different
values for the slope and the shift have in the overall cell throughput achieved
by the SISO HSDPA Simulator. For the evaluations, one of the two parame-
ters have been fixed and the other one has a big range of values to observe the
effect of each single variable. The results show how important is the choice of
these values, as explained in subsection 5.3.2. The throghput values in [bps]
are calculated for different slopes and shifts, and we can observe a bit peak
in the curve in values around 1 for the slope and 0 in case of the shift. When
using very distant values there is a big drop off in the evaluated throughput.
56
Figure 5.8: Throughput as function of the slope value with shift = 0.
57
slope and shift values, the investigations have been done by using low steps
from the minimun to the maximum value, so that it is not probable to miss
any optimum couple of values.
We concludes the chapter with Figure 5.10, which shows how the through-
put is reaching different values and the maximum is achieved for a slope value
of 1 and a shift value of -0.4, according to the results that we observed in the
two previously figures.
58
Chapter 6
Miscellaneous
This chapter includes other changes in the initial simulator and investigations
during this thesis that really do not fit into the previous chapters. Section 6.1
explains new scenarios for the positioning of the users. Section 6.2 includes
some improvements for calculating the macro-scale pathloss by considering
the three antenna radiations of every Nodes-B, and further enhancements
such as the obtention of the outage users and plots of the average throughput
are treated in 6.3.
Figure 6.2 illustrates the first two scenarios in greater detail. Snapshot means
the users are uniformly and randomly situated according to the grid posi-
tions, whereas exhaustive snapshot refers the user positions are unformly
situated but fixed at all possible grid positions. It is importat to remember
that the users are situated in the main sector of the serving Node-B.
In Figure 6.3 we can observe an explample with the remaining two possi-
bilities. Fixed angle and fixed distance denote that the angle between the
user and the radiation directions or the distance to the main Node-B, re-
spectively, are fixed in the load settings. In this explamples, the angle is
fixed at 90o , which means that the users are situated in the same direction
59
Figure 6.1: Four possible user positions configuration.
than the main radiation, and the distance is changing. In the other scenario,
the distance between the users and the Node-B is 100 meters, but the angle
changes.
60
Figure 6.3: Fixed angle and fixed distance scenarios.
Figure 6.4 illustrates the network scheme used in the simulation, although
an scenario with 7 cells is also possible. We can observe the user position in
the target sector, the main base station in the center and the three radiation
directions (90o , 210o and 330o ).
61
Figure 6.4: Network with 19 base stations and 3 sectors model.
haves when increasing the distance between the user and the Node-B. When
the user is near the BS, there is a low pathloss, and it is increasing with
the distance. In Figure 6.6 the pathloss as function of the angle in degrees
is represented. As before, if the UE is situated in such position that the
antenna is radiating directly to it (which is the case when the angle is 0o ),
the macro-scale pathloss is very low, whereas when the angle is changing the
pathloss increases.
62
Figure 6.5: Variation of the user pathloss with the distance.
tribution function. Besides, it’s possible to plot the number of outage users
as function of the power. As explained in [24], if the UE cannot support the
minimum CQI (CQI = 1) at BLER = 0.1, then the UE reports CQI=0 which
indicates an ”Out of range” (OOR) condition to the Node B.
As we can observe in Figure 6.7 when a low power is used, the number of
63
outage users is very high; then, as the power is increasing, there is a big drop-
off, and finally for the highest values of the power, the intercell interferences
are also increasing and a small increment in the outage users is produced.
thus, the average rate of messages succesfully delivered over the channel
is estimated by means of the multiplication of the transport block size and
the probability of having no errors. This throughput (in terms of bits that
went through correctly) is consecutively averaged over 500 realizations per
64
user.
In the new version of the simulator, we can plot the throughput of every
users by means of a new function. The new user positioning explained be-
fore, allows us to represent the throughput over the different scenarios. Thus,
we can observe the influence of the user positions, focusing our interest in
the fixed angle and fixed distance scenarios.
Figure 6.8 shows the average throughput as function of the angle when every
user has the same distance to the serving Node-B. Accordingly the effect of
the angle between the direction radiation and the user-position can be ob-
served. The users positioned around a 90o angle are situated in the same
direction that the main radiation of the antenna, so the achieved through-
put is the highest possible, while as the angle is increasing or decreasing the
throughput decrements until finally it is completely zero. Furthermore, we
can observe in the figure the calculated average throughput under two dif-
ferent situations in order to apreciate the influence of the distance: picture
in the left corresponds to an scenario in which a distance of 50 meters to
the BS is fixed, so due to the closeness the throughput reachs values of 2.5
Mbps. Picture in the right represents the opposite situation, where the dis-
tance is 250 meters so the throughput is much lower, reaching a maximum
value around 80 Kbps.
Table 6.1 specifies some of the main simulation settings used for the gen-
eration of Figures 6.8 and 6.9.
Simulation settings
Number of R’99 users 5
Number of HSDPA users 40
Node-B distance 0.25 Km
Codes used for HS-DSCH 10
Maximum Node-B power 20 W
HSDPA range power 0-14 W
Table 6.1: Simulation settings used in the generation of Figures 6.8 and 6.9
In Figure 6.9 the throughput of the users is illustrated for the fixed angle
scenario. Thus, the throughput as function of the distance can be observed,
65
Figure 6.8: Throughput as a function of the angle with two fixed BS - user
positions distances (50 meters in the figure of the left and 250 meters in the
right).
and as before, the influence of the distance between the users and the main
Node-B is evaluated. We can observe how the throughput is higher around
the small distances and lower for langer distances. Here we also evaluate the
throughput of two different scenarios. The picture in the left side has been
obtained by using a fixed angle of 80o , so it is possible to achieve high values
like a throughput of 2.5 Mbps, as before. As a difference, in the right side
the angle used is 40o , so the antenna does not radiate with a proper direction
and it is only possible to achieve maximum throughput values around 100
Kbps.
66
Figure 6.9: Throughput as a function of the distances with two fixed angles
between the users and the BS (80o in the figure of the left and 40o in the
right).
67
Chapter 7
Conclusions
68
7.1 Simulator enhancement
This thesis has consisted in the development of new functionalities in the
MATLAB simulator created by the Institute of Communications and Radio-
Frequency of the Vienna University of Technology. These functionalities are
necessary for the investigation of the main enhancements explained before.
The initial purpose of the simulator was to evaluate the performance of a
mixed network in which both R’99 and HSDPA traffics are simulated, in
order to find the optimum parameters to obtain the maximum overall cell
throughput.
One of the most important extensions in the SISO HSDPA simulator was the
inplementation of new functions that allow us for the handling of real network
layout data that the Mobilkom Austria AG provided by means of measured
path-loss matrices of an HSDPA cluster. This data have been converted in
an useful form to be analyzable in the simulator, and the source-code has
been enabled to use the data files after the necessary modifications.
The second extension concerns the CQI values reported by the user equip-
ment. It consisted in the optimization of the CQI mapping in order to max-
imize the overall cell throughput. This mapping is important since a poorly
algorithm on one model of UE can have an adverse effect on the efficient
allocation of network resources. The initial formula used previously in the
simulator has been modified. For the purpose of achieving the new mapping
and visualization, we have represented the CQI values as function of the
SINR, with two new parameters: a scale factor to change the slope of the
mapping, and a shift value used like an offset.
Finally, some other changes in the initial simulator have been implemented,
namely:
• The possibility of choosing four different situations concerning the users
positions: snapshot, fixed distance, fixed angle and exhaustive snap-
shot. The type of simulation is chosen in the settings and accordingly
the users positions are established. This enhances the simulation in the
sense that it is possible to analize the user pathloss and throughput for
every scenarios.
• More efficient implementation of the macro-scale pathloss generation,
by considering the three antenna radiations of every Nodes-B, includ-
ing the principal and the neighboring, in order to sum the overall cell
interference for each user.
69
• HSDPA outage users calculation as function of the power.
7.2 Results
This section presents a summary of the results obtained with the new devel-
oped functionalities in the simulator. First, table 7.1 shows the optimizations
in the new CQI mapping in order to maximize the overall cell throughput,
by changing two new parameters: slope and shift. The tables present some
values of the slope and shift that cause significative throughputs. As a con-
clusion, the optimum pair of values are pointed out in yellow.
Shift = 0 Slope = 1
Slope Throughput Shift Throughput
0.5 0.6 Mbps -2 0.1 Mbps
0.75 1 Mbps -1 0.5 Mbps
1 1.5 Mbps -0.4 0.7 Mbps
1.2 0.1 Mbps 2 0.55 Mbps
Table 7.1: Variation of the throughput as function of the slope and shift.
70
Power Outage users
0.2 W 45%
1W 10%
4 - 11 W 5%
11 - 14 W 6%
Table 7.2: Variation of the outage users as function of the range of HSDPA
power.
In Tables 7.3 and 7.4 some values of the macro-scale pathloss for differ-
ent distances and angles between the user and the main Node-B are shown,
and Table 7.5 presents some significative values of the throughput calculated
within different scenarios of the users possitions. We can observe the great
influence of the user position in the pathloss and throughput generation.
Angle Pathloss
0o -95 dB
30o -100 dB
60o -110 dB
100o -180o -133 dB
Table 7.3: Variation of the pathloss as function of the angle between the user
and the Node-B.
Distance Pathloss
20 m -55 dB
100 m -78 dB
250 m -93 dB
500 m -103 dB
Table 7.4: Variation of the pathloss as function of the distance between the
user and the Node-B.
71
❵❵❵
❵❵❵Distance
❵❵ ❵
Close Medium Far
Orientation ❵❵❵❵❵❵
Good 2.5 Mbps 1.5 Mbps 90 Kbps
Medium 2 Mbps 900 Kpbs 5 Kpbs
Bad 100 Kbps 5 Kpbs 0 Kpbs
72
Bibliography
73
[11] 3GPP. Technical Specification Group Radio Access Network. Physical
layer procedures (FDD)(Release 7). (3GPP TS 25.214 version 7.6.0).
[12] Members of 3GPP, ”Technical specification group radio access network;
multiple input multiple output in utra,” 3GPP, Tech. Rep. v7.0.0, Mar.
2007.
[13] Members of COST 231. ”Digital mobile radio towards future generation
systems - COST 231 final report”. COST, Tech. Reo., 1999.
[14] A.Seeger, M.Sikora, and A.Klein, ”Variable orthogonality factor: a sim-
ple interface between link and system level simulation for high speed
downlink packet access,” in Proc. of the IEEE Vehicular Technology
Conference 2003, Oct. 2003, pp. 2531-2534.
[15] F.Brouwer, I. de Bruin, J.Silva, N.Souto, F.Cercas, and A.Correia. ”Us-
age of link-level performance indicators for HSDPA network-level simu-
lations in E-UMTS”, in Proc. of the Eight Internationsl Symposium on
Spread Spectrum Techniques and Applications, Sept. 2004.
[16] R.Litjens, ”HSDPA flow level performance and the impact of termi-
nal mobility,” in Proc. of the Wireless Communications and Networking
Conference, Mar. 2005, pp. 1657-1663.
[17] Dieter J. Cichon and Thomas Kürner, ”Propagation Prediction Models”,
Chapter 4, COST 1998.
[18] D. McGirl, P. C. Fannin, ”Digital Elevation Modelling,” COST 231
TD(94)75, Prague, Czech Republic, 1994.
[19] B. E. Gschwendtner, ”Practical investigation using ray optical prediction
techniques in microcells,” COST 231 TD(94)127, 1994
[20] Qun Hou, Dexiu Huang, ”Channel Quality Indication (CQI) Application
in HSDPA Simulation”, in IEEE Wireless Communications, Networking
and Mobile Computing, 2007. WiCom 2007. International Conference
on, pp. 1200-1203, Sept.
[21] H. Vishwanathan (1999), ”Capacity of Markov channels with receiver
CSI and delayed feedback”, IEEE Trans. on Information Theory, 45(2),
pp. 761-771, March.
[22] A. Boariu (2003), ”Effect of delay commands on adaptive modulation
scheme in fading channels”, IEEE Proc. Vehicular Technology Confer-
ence (VTC), October.
74
[23] 3rd Generation Partnership Project, Physical Layer Procedures, (Mar.
2004). TS 25.214, Version 6.1.0. [Online]. Available: www.3gpp.org
[28] M. Wrulich and M. Rupp. ”Efficient Link Measurement Model for Sys-
tem Level Simulations of Alamouti Encoded MIMO HSDPA Transmis-
sions”. International (ITG) Workshop on Smart Antennas (WSA). Feb.
2008.
75