WCDMA Power Control

Principle

Huawei Confidential
 Chapter 1 Power Overview

Chapter 2 Power Control Algorithm

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 Purpose of power control

• Purpose of power control

 Power control of the uplink channel is mainly to overcome
the near-far effect.
 Downlink channel power control is to overcome fast fading and the

interferences of adjacent cells.

• Power control must be used in CDMA system to

ensure every user transmit by minimum power and
the network capacity can get maximum.
• The purpose of inner loop power control (in the UL UE
to Node B) of the WCDMA system is to maintain a
certain
21/2/5
signal-to-interference ratio (SIR target) of
3
transmission signal power when the signals reach the
 The Relationship between Transmitted Power and
Received Power after Power Control Methods
Introduced

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Channel
15 Transmitted power
Received power
10
Relative power (dB)

-5

-10

-15

-20
0 200 400 600 800

Time (ms)
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 Benefit from Power Control

• Benefit from power control

 Power control is known to be essential in a CDMA-based system due to
the uplink near-far problem
 Adjust transmission power to ensure communication quality of uplink
and downlink.
 Power control can well overcome the influences of unfavorable factors
such as fast fading, slow fading on radio channels
 Decrease network interference, increase the capacity and quality of
network
 In a word, the purpose of power control is to ensure the QoS with
minimum power in the CDMA system.

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 Power control classification
TPC Command SIR Target

SIR Bler/Ber
UE NodeB RNC

Inner Loop Power Control

Outer Loop Power Control

Open Loop Power Control

 Power control classification ：

• Open loop Power control

• Closed loop Power control is divided into two main parts:
• Inner power control UE-Node B
• Outer power control Node B-RNC
– Uplink inner power control
– Downlink inner-power control
– Uplink outer power control
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– Downlink outer power control
 Power control methods adopted for various physical channels

• Power control methods adopted for various physical

channels
• "X" – can be applied, "–" – not applied
Physical Open loop Inner loop Outer No power control process,
channel power power loop power is specified by upper
control control power layers.
Control
DPDCH － X X －
DPCCH X X X －
PCCPCH － － － X
SCCPCH － － － X
PRACH X － － －
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AICH － － － X
 Chapter 1 Power Overview

Chapter 2 Power Control Algorithm

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 Chapter 2 Power Control Algorithm

1.Open loop power control

2.Inner-loop power control

3.Outer loop power control

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 Open Loop Power Control Overview

• Purpose
 the UE estimates the power loss of signals on the propagation
path by measuring the downlink channel signals (CPICH-Tx
power), then calculate the transmission power of the uplink
channel

• The open loop power control principal

 Under the FDD mode, fast fading of the uplink channel is

unrelated to fast fading of the downlink channel.

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 Open Loop Power Control Overview

• the disadvantage of open loop power control

 This power control method is rather vague

• Application scenarios of open loop power

control
 In the range of a cell, signal fading caused by fast fading is
usually more
serious than that caused by propagation loss. Therefore, open
loop power control is applied only at the beginning of connection
setup, generally in setting the initial power value.

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 Open Loop Power Control of PRACH

One access slot

Acq.
AICH access Ind.
slots RX at UE


p-a
PRACH access Pre- Pre- Message part
amble amble
slots TX at UE

 
p-p p-m

The random access procedure of PRACH is shown in above figure:

UE transmit a preamble using the selected uplink access slot,
signature, and preamble transmission power. After that ,UTARN
will response AI if the preamble is received. Then the UE will
12 transmit
21/2/5 the message part if the AI is received. But, if UE does not
 Open Loop Power Control of PRACH

• The initial value of PRACH power is set through open

loop power control
Preamble_Initial_Power = PCPICH DL TX power －
CPICH_RSCP + UL
interference + Constant Value
• Parameters explanation
 The values of PCPICH DL TX power 、 UL interference and Constant
Value are given in system information.
 The value of CPICH_RSCP is measured by UE

 PCPICH DL TX power is very closed to the downlink coverage ability,

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which
21/2/5 is already given in cell setup.
 Open loop power control of PRACH

Pp-m

Power Ramp Step

Preamble_Initial_
power

10ms/20ms

Parameter Parameter meaning

NO.
1 Power Offset Pp-m The power offset of the last access preamble and
message control part. This value plus the access
preamble power is the power of the control part
2 Constant Value This parameter is the correction constant used for the
21/2/5 UE to estimate the initial transmission power of
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PRACH according to the open loop power
 Open loop power control of PRACH

• Different Constant Values for different stage of

WCDMA network
lifecycle. Take the beginning stage for example:
 Constant Value could be greater (-16dB or -15dB) so that the preamble
message can be received easier by UTRAN
 The power ramp step could be greater so that the possibility which the
preamble message can be received correctly will be higher

• With the development of network, the number of

users increased
very fast. On this stage, the Constant value could be

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less
21/2/5 1dB.
 UE Serving RNS RNC

Open loop power control of PRACH

1. CCCH : RRC Connection Request
RRC RRC
Application scenarios
Allocate RNTI
Select L1 and L2
parameters

2. Radio Link Setup Request

NBAP NBAP
Open loop power
control of PRACH Start RX
description

3. Radio Link Setup Response

NBAP NBAP

4. ALCAP Iub Data Transport Bearer Setup

5. Downlink Synchronisation
DCH - FP DCH - FP

6. Uplink Synchronisation
DCH - FP DCH - FP

Start TX
description

7. CCCH : RRC Connection Set up

RRC RRC

8. Radio Link Restore Indication

NBAP NBAP

9. DCCH : RRC Connection Setup Complete

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RRC RRC
 Open loop power control of DL DPCCH

• The DL DPCCH open loop power control can be

calculated by the
following formula:

P= （ Ec/Io)Req - CPICH_Ec/Io + PCPICH

• Parameters explanation
 (Ec/Io)req is the required Ec/Io, which should satisfied UE can receive
the message from the dedicated channel correctly
 CPICH_Ec/Io is measured by UE, then it is given to UTRAN by RACH

 PCPICH is the transmission power of CPICH

• Comments
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Similar to UL, the (Ec/Io)Req value should be considered very carefully
 Open loop power control of DL DPCCH
Application scenarios

Node B Serving
UE
Serving RNS RNC

1. CCCH : RRC Connection Request

RRC RRC

Allocate RNTI
Select L1 and L2
parameters

2. Radio Link Setup Request

NBAP NBAP

Start RX
description
3. Radio Link Setup Response
NBAP NBAP

4. ALCAP Iub Data Transport Bearer Setup

Open loop power
5. Downlink Synchronisation
control of DPCCH DCH - FP DCH - FP

6. Uplink Synchronisation
DCH - FP DCH - FP

Start TX
description

7. CCCH : RRC Connection Set up

RRC RRC
8. Radio Link Restore Indication
NBAP NBAP

9. DCCH : RRC Connection Setup Complete

RRC RRC

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 Open loop power control of UL DPCCH

• The UL DPCCH open loop power control can be

calculated by the
following formula:
DPCCH_Initial_power ＝ PCPICH DL TX power -
CPICH_RSCP
+ UL interference + DPCCH_SIRtarget
• References explanation
 PCPICH DL TX power is the transmission power of CPICH
 CPICH_RSCP can be measured by UE
 UL interference can be measured by NodeB

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• Comments
 Open loop power control of UL DPCCH
Application scenarios

Node B Serving
UE
Serving RNS RNC

1. CCCH : RRC Connection Request

RRC RRC

Allocate RNTI
Select L1 and L2
parameters

2. Radio Link Setup Request

NBAP NBAP

Start RX
description
3. Radio Link Setup Response
NBAP NBAP

4. ALCAP Iub Data Transport Bearer Setup

5. Downlink Synchronisation
Open loop power DCH - FP DCH - FP

control of DPCCH DCH - FP

6. Uplink Synchronisation
DCH - FP

Start TX
description
7. CCCH : RRC Connection Set up
RRC RRC
8. Radio Link Restore Indication
NBAP NBAP

9. DCCH : RRC Connection Setup Complete

RRC RRC

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 Chapter 2 Power Control Algorithm

1.Open loop power control

2.Inner-loop power control

3.Outer loop power control

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 Close loop power control

Why the close loop power control is needed

• The deficiencies of open loop power control

 the open loop power control can decided the initial power, but it’s still
inaccurate
 For WCDMA-FDD system, the uplink fading is not related to the
downlink
one because of the big frequency interval of them
 Therefore, the path loss and interference estimated by downlink can not
reflect
the one in uplink completely. But, the close loop power control can
solve this problem

• The advantages of close loop power control

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 Can convergence the transmission power of uplink and downlink very
 Inner-loop power control

The principle for Inner-loop power control

• The receivers calculate the SIR by estimating the

power strengthen
and the current interference. Then, compare this one
to SIRtarget,
 If less than SIRtarget, the TPC is 1 to tell receivers increase
transmission power
 If greater than SIRtarget, the TPC is 0 to tell receivers decrease
transmission power

• The receiver which get the TPC will adjust the

transmission power by algorithms. The inner loop
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power control can convergence the
 Inner-loop power control

I nner-loop power control Algorithm

• In 3GPP protocol, two algorithms are adopted in the

inner-loop
power control of uplink DPCCH
 PCA1(Power Control Algorithm) ， uplink power control step is
△tpc=1dB or 2dB
 PCA2 ， uplink power control step is △tpc=1dB

• The power control adjustment range in DPCCH is

△ DPCCH=△tpc× TPC_cmd
 TPC_cmd is achieved by different algorithm

21/2/5
24 • The power offset shows the difference of
 Uplink-inner loop power control

• NodeB compares the measured signal-to-

interference ratio
to the preset target signal-to-interference ratio
1500Hz

(SIRtarget).
Inner-loop

Transmit TPC
UE
set SIRtar
NodeB

Each UE has own loop

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 Uplink-inner loop power control

DPDCH/DPCCH structure

Data
DPDCH N data bits

T = 2560 chips, N = 10*2 k bits (k=0..6)

slot data

Pilot TFCI FBI TPC

DPCCH N pilot bits N TFCI bits N FBI bits N TPC bits

T = 2560 chips, 10 bits

slot

Slot #0 Slot #1 Slot #i Slot #14

1 radio frame: T = 10 ms
f

 c2
The power ratio of DPCCH to DPDCH
 d2is
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 Uplink-inner loop power control

TPC

• The uplink DPCCH SIR should be estimated by

different serving cells.
In each time slot, the TPC can be generated by the
following rules:
 No soft handover

• If SIR estimation is greater than SIR target, the TPC is 0 to

decrease the transmission power
• If SIR estimation is less than SIR target, the TPC is 1 to
increase the transmission power
 Soft handover

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21/2/5 • In one time slot, UE received several TPC, then combine then .
 Uplink-inner loop power control

• UE can adjust the UL DPCCH transmission

power with △ tpc step
according to the received TPC_cmd
• The step △ tpc can be 1dB or 2dB, which is
decided by UTRAN
 If the TPC_cmd is 1 ， the UL DPCCH and UL
DPDCH transmission power should be increased
△ tpc
 If the TPC_cmd is -1 ， the UL DPCCH and UL
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DPDCH transmission power should be decreased

 Uplink-inner loop power control

PCA1

• UE only can receive one TPC in non-soft handover

situation,
 If TPC ＝ 0 ， TPC_cmd= -1

 If TPC ＝ 1 ， TPC_cmd= 1

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 Uplink-inner loop power control

PCA1

• When UE is in soft handover

 UE can receive several TPCs in one time slot and combine
them to get one TPC_cmd by the following two steps:
• First, combine the TPCs from one RLS
• Then, combine the TPCs from different RLS

• Comments
 The TPC from RLSi is Wi

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 Uplink-inner loop power control

PCA1

• Wi can be achieved by the following rules

 If the TPC is 0, Wi=0

 If the TPC is 1, Wi ＝ 1

 Assume UE has N RLSes ， N TPC can be obtained after

combination, W1 、 W2…WN. The combination method for these
N TPCs from N RLSes can be described as following formula

TPC_cmd = γ (W1, W2, … WN)

• γ function should satisfied:

 If one Wi is 0, TPC_cmd is -1

 If all Wi are 1 ， TPC_cmd is 1

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 Uplink-inner loop power control

PCA2

• If UE is not in soft handover

 Only one TPC is received in one time slot. The power control can be done
once by each 5 time slots. Each frame is divided 3 groups with 5 time
slots. In the first 4 time slots, the TPC_cmds are 0, which means the
power does not change. In the 5th time slot, the TPC_cmd can be
achieved by the following rules:
• If all the TPC are 0, the TPC_cmd is -1 and the transmission will decrease
1dB;
TPC （ RX ） TPC_cmd
• If all the TPC are 1, the TPC_cmd is 1 and the transmission will increase
0000 0 0000 -1
1dB;
1111 1
• Otherwise, TPC_cmd=0.
0000 1

21/2/5 else 0000 0

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 Uplink-inner loop power control

PCA2

• When UE is in soft handover, the TPC_cmd can be

achieved by the
following two steps
 First, combine the TPC from a same RLS

• N TPCi (i = 1,2......N) can be achieved from N RLSes in each time slot

• The N TPC_cmds from different RLS can be achieved by the above
mentioned rules. So the first 4 time slot, the TPC_cmd is 0. And the
each final TPC_cmd is decided in the 5th time slot
• Assume the each final TPC_cmd from N RLS are TPC_tempi （ i =
1,2......N ）
• The first 4 time slots, all TPC_tempi = 0
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• Take the average.
 Uplink-inner loop power control

Comparison between PCA1 and PCA2

• The control frequency

 TPC1, the power control frequency is 1500Hz

 TPC2, the power control frequency is 300Hz

• Application scenarios
 When UE is moving with high speed (80Km/h), the fast inner-loop
power control can not catch up with the fast fading, which produce
negative gain. In this situation, PCA2 is preferred.

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 Downlink Inner-loop power control

1500Hz
Set SIRtar

Transmit TPC

Inner-loop

Measure SIR and compare

NodeB

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 Downlink inner-loop power control

Timeslot structure of Downlink DPCH :

－ PO1 defines the power offset of the TFCI bit in the downlink
DPCCH to DPDCH.
－ PO2 defines the power offset of the TPC bit in the downlink
DPCCH to DPDCH.
－ PO3 defines the power offset of the Pilot bit in the downlink
DPCCH to DPDCH.
－ The values of PO1 、 PO2 and PO3 are defined by RNC.

The inner-loop power control of downlink DPCCH include two typies: one is the
inner-loop power control in compressed mode, the other is the inner-loop power
control in non-compressed mode.

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 Downlink inner-loop power control

• Firstly, UE should estimate the downlink

DPDCH/DPCCH power and the current SIR
• Then, UE can generate TPC by comparing the
estimated SIR to target SIR
 If the estimated SIR is greater than the target one, TPC is 0 (decrease
power)
 If the estimated SIR is less than the target one, TPC is 1 (increase
power)

• The step of DL inner-loop power control could be

0.5 、 1 、 1.5 or 2dB
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 Downlink inner-loop power control
Power control in different state

• When UE is not in soft handover

 The TPC which is generated by UE is transmitted in TPC domain of UL
channel

• When UE is in soft handover, two power control

modes can be used, which is decided by DPC_mode:
 DPC_MODE ＝ 0 ， UE will transmit TPC in every slot

 DPC_MODE ＝ 1 ， UE will transmit the same TPC in every three time

slot

• When the downlink channel is in out of

synchronization, UE will transmit TPC 1 because UE
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can not measure the downlink SIR
 Downlink Power Balance

• Downlink power balance

process
N
D IN
o
 SRNC can monitor every single o
n
Pd
de
it
B
NodeB’s transmission. If SRNC eiB
B
a
p
found the power offset in soft rt
e
o
handover is too much, it will
ct
h
command the DPB process e
e
s
D
s
P
B
• The initiation and stop of
p
r
DPB o
c
 The power offset of two RL is e
s
39 greater
21/2/5 than the DPB initial s
 Chapter 2 Power Control Algorithm

1.Open loop power control

2.Inner-loop power control

3.Outer loop power control

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 Outer-loop power control

• The limitation of inner loop power control

 The purpose of inner loop power control of the WCDMA system is to
maintain a certain signal-to-interference ratio of transmission signal
power when the signals reach the receiving end.

• The character of outer-loop power control

 The QoS which NAS provide to CN is BLER, not SIR

• The relationship between inner-loop power control

and outer-loop
power control
 SIR target should be satisfied with the requirement of decoding
correctly.
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But different multiple path radio environment request different SIR
 Uplink outer loop power control

Measure received
get the good quality data and
service data compare BLER in Measure and compare SIR
the TrCH

Out loop Inner-loop

Set SIRtar Transmit TPC

Set BLERtar

10-100Hz

RNC NodeB UE

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 Downlink outer loop power control

Measure and compare BLER L3

1500Hz 10-100Hz
Outer loop
set SIRtar

Transmit TPC

Inner loop L1

Measure and compare SIR

NodeB

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 outer loop power control

SIR target adjustment step

 BLERmeas  BLERt arg et 

SIRtar   SIRAdjustcoefficient * SIRAdjustStep * 
 BLERt arg et 

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 Outter loop power control

Uplink outer loop power control command transmit to

NodeB through DCH-FP

Node B SRNC

OUTER LOOP PC
……

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 Thank You

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