LTE Fundamentals 1

LTE Fundamentals and Basic

Planning/Optimization
BY
Ali. A Esswie
NA RSRC, NPS team
alia.esswie@huawei.com
 LTE Fundamentals 2

Content
• In this presentation, The basic knowledge of the LTE
technology is presented including, the OFDM basics, DL
OFDMA, Resource allocation, LTE SAE, Roaming and
Protocol Stack, etc.
• Additionally, LTE addressing, PHY channels, Initial access,
MIMO modes and Link adaptation are followed as well.

*This ppt contains some copied information from Huawei internal documents,
hence, this material is ONLY for huawei internal distribution
-- Ali Esswie
 LTE Fundamentals 3

DAY 2
 Page 4

Brief Introduction of Physical Channels

Downlink Channels：
 Physical Broadcast Channel (PBCH): Carries system information
BCH MCH PCH DL-SCH
for cell search, such as cell ID. Downlink
Transport channels
 Physical Downlink Control Channel (PDCCH) : Carries the
resource allocation of PCH and DL-SCH, and Hybrid ARQ MAC Layer

information. Physical Layer

 Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH) : Carries the Downlink

downlink user data. Physical channels
PBCH PMCH PDSCH PDCCH
 Physical Control Format Indicator Channel (PCFICH) : Carriers Mapping between downlink transport
information of the OFDM symbols number used for the PDCCH. channels and downlink physical channels
 Physical Hybrid ARQ Indicator Channel (PHICH) : Carries Hybrid
ARQ ACK/NACK in response to uplink transmissions.
 Physical Multicast Channel (PMCH) : Carries the multicast
information.
UL-SCH RACH
Uplink
Transport channels
Uplink Channels：
MAC Layer
 Physical Random Access Channel (PRACH) : Carries the random
Physical Layer
access preamble.
 Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH) : Carries the uplink user Uplink
Physical channels
data. PUSCH PRACH PUCCH

 Physical Uplink Control Channel (PUCCH) : Carries the HARQ Mapping between uplink transport channels
ACK/NACK, Scheduling Request (SR) and Channel Quality and downlink physical channels
Indicator (CQI), etc.
 LTE Fundamentals 5

LTE Physical Channels – List Summarized

 LTE Fundamentals 6

DL Channels – Allocation Standard

 Page 7

Downlink Physical Signals

Downlink RS (Reference Signal):
 Similar with Pilot signal of CDMA. Used for downlink physical channel
One Antenna Port

R0 R0 demodulation and channel quality measurement (CQI)

Cell-Specific RS Three types of RS in protocol. Cell-Specific Reference Signal is essential
One antenna port


R0 R0

Mapping in Time- and the other two types RS (MBSFN Specific RS & UE-Specific RS) are
R0 R0
Frequency Domain optional.
R0 R0 Characteristics:
l0 l6 l0 l6
 Cell-Specific Reference Signals are generated from cell-
RE
Resource element (k,l)
specific RS sequence and frequency shift mapping. RS is the
Two Antenna Ports

R0 R0 R1 R1
pseudo-random sequence transmits in the time-frequency
Not used for RS domain.
Two antenna ports

transmission on this
R0 R0 R1 R1
antenna
Not porton this antenna port
used for transmission  The frequency interval of RS is 6 subcarriers.
R0 R0 R1 R1
RS symbols on this
Reference symbols on this antenna port
 RS distributes discretely in the time-frequency domain,
antenna port sampling the channel situation which is the reference of DL
R0 R0 R1 R1
l0 l6 l0 l6 l0 l6 l0 l6 demodulation.

R0 R0 R1 R1 R2 R3
Four Antenna Ports

R1: RS transmitted in 1st ant port

Four antenna ports

R0 R0 R1 R1 R2 R3 R2: RS transmitted in 2nd ant port

R0 R0 R1 R1 R2 R3
R3: RS transmitted in 3rd ant port
R4: RS transmitted in 4th ant port
R0 R0 R1 R1 R2 R3
l0 l6 l0 l6 l0 l6 l0 l6 l0 l6 l0 l6 l0 l6 l0 l6
MBSFN: Multicast/Broadcast over a
even-numbered slots odd-numbered slots even-numbered slots odd-numbered slots even-numbered slots odd-numbered slots even-numbered slots odd-numbered slots Single Frequency Network

Antenna port 0 Antenna port 1 Antenna port 2 Antenna port 3

Antenna Port 0 Antenna Port 1 Antenna Port 2 Antenna Port 3

 Page 8
Scheduling and Link Auto-adaptation
User Multiplexing and Scheduling
 Large system bandwidth (10/15/20MHz) of LTE will
facing the problem of frequency selected fading. The
fading characteristic on subcarriers of one user can be
regarded as same, but different in further subcarriers.
 Select better subcarriers for specific user according to
the fading characteristic. User diversity can be
achieved to increase spectrum efficiency.
 The LTE schedule period is one or more TTI.
 The channel propagation information is feed back to e-
NodeB through the uplink. Channel quality identity is
the overheading of system. The less, the better.
Channel Propagation Fading
Link Auto-adaptation
 LTE support link auto-adaptation in time-domain
and frequency-domain. Modulation scheme is
selected based on the channel quality in
time/frequency-domain.
 In CDMA system, power control is one important link
auto-adaptation technology, which can avoid
interference by far-near effect. In LTE system, user
multiplexed by OFDM technology. Power control is
used to reduce the uplink interference from adjacent
cell, to compensate path loss. It is one type of slow
link auto-adaptation scheme.
User Multiplexing and Scheduling
 LTE Fundamentals 9

LTE Link Adaptation – CQI Reporting

- Channel Quality Indicator [CQI]: feedback sent from UE to serving
eNB each agreed period, in 3GPP standards and OJO -> 5ms
- CQI represents HOW GOOD THE USER CHANNEL IS LITTLE
BEFORE NOW?
Transmitted CQI bits
are NOT data, hence
HW LTE features:
work to reduce the
fed-back CQI as
much as possible,
however, increasing
CQI periodicity
increase chances of
capturing wrong
outdated channels

CQI is 4 quantized bits = Q(Received estimated SINR)

 LTE Fundamentals 10

LTE Link Adaptation – MCS Adaptation

Modulation and Coding Schemes

(MCS):
Are the provided coding rates and
modulation per user

 Low coded symbols: higher DATA

rates with weak immunity to fading
channel
 Highly coded symbols: lower
DATA rates with strong immunity to
fading channel
System DYNAMICALLY
changes coding rates and
modulation orders per each
user channel CQI feedback,
this directly impacts user
throughput and packet RETX.
 LTE Fundamentals 11

LTE Scheduling – Policy Enforcements

Proportional Fair (PF) Progressive Max C/i
 Maintains Rate Fairness across  Progressively biases to users
cell, however, doesn’t consider with the BEST channel conditions
Theoretical

delays/ priority – produces USER Max Traffic

Practical
 Extremely suitable for LTE test and USER throughput
beds but not for real time traffic  May lead to access rejection /
Link failures to cell edge users

enhanced Proportional Fair (ePF)

 Maintains Rate Fairness across
cell AND priority as well

Practical
 Practical Scheduling algorithm
that is used in many LTE networks.
 LTE Fundamentals 12

MIMO In LTE
Layer 1, CW1, AMC1
S UE2
User1 MIMO
F encoder
codeword Mod B and layer
C mapping UE1

Layer 2, CW2, AMC2

UE1
 LTE Fundamentals 13

RX Diversity
 LTE Fundamentals 14

MIMO Spatial Multiplexing

 LTE Fundamentals 15

Learn In a Jiffy- LTE Automatic Neighbor Relation

(ANR)
 Page 16

Learn In a Jiffy- Cell Interference Control

ICIC（Inter-Cell Interference Coordination）
 ICIC is one solution for the cell interference control, is essentially a schedule strategy. In LTE, some
coordination schemes( ICIC ) can control the interference in cell edges to enhance the frequency reuse factor
and performance in the cell edges.

The edge band is assigned to the users

in cell edge. The eNB transmit power of Center Center
Band Band
the edge band can be high.
Center Band Power Cell 2,4,6

Power Cell 1 Frequency

Cell 2,4,6 Primary Band
2
Frequency
Cell 1 Edge Band 7 3 Center
Band
The center band is assigned to the users in cell 1
center. The eNB transmit power of the center
band should be reduced in order to avoid the 6 4 Power Cell 3,5,7
interference to the edge band of neighbor cells.
5 Frequency
Cell 3,5,7P Edge Band
 Page 17

Learn In a Jiffy- TTI Bundling

40% Coverage
3~5dB gain Increased TTI bundling, 30% coverage
enhancement
coverage enhancement solutions
TTI bundling can be applied:
TTI bundling: 4dB gain Limited by uplink coverage
Uplink

VoIP or PS data services

IRC: 3dB gain 30% with low data rate
Before Bundling
RRU close to Antenna: 3dB gain

High Rx Sensitivity: 2-3dB gain

4 Antenna Receive Diversity (MIMO):

3dB gain Bundle 4 TTIs together
Radius
Downlink

After Bundling
4*2/4*4 MIMO: 3dB gain

RRU close to Antenna: 3dB gain

Same UL resource transmitted 4 times
4dB gain in UL coverage
2*40W High Output Power: 3dB gain
 LTE Fundamentals 18

LTE Access In Idle Mode

 Page 19

Physical Layer Procedure — Cell Search

Basic Principle of Cell Search: Initial Cell Search:
 Cell search is the procedure of UE synchronizes with E-  The initial cell search is carried on after the UE power on. Usually,
UTRAN in time-freq domain, and acquires the serving cell UE doesn’t know the network bandwidth and carrier frequency at the
first time switch on.
ID.
 UE repeats the basic cell search, tries all the carrier frequency in the
 Two steps in cell search: spectrum to demodulate the synchronization signals. This procedure
 Step 1: Symbol synchronization and acquirement of takes time, but the time requirement are typically relatively relaxed.
ID within Cell Group by demodulating the Primary Some methods can reduce time, such as recording the former
available network information as the prior search target.
Synchronization Signal;
 Once finish the cell search, which achieve synchronization of time-
 Step 2: Frame synchronization, acquirement of CP freq domain and acquirement of Cell ID, UE demodulates the PBCH
length and Cell Group ID by demodulating the and acquires for system information, such as bandwidth and Tx
Secondary Synchronization Signal. antenna number.
 After the procedure above, UE demodulates the PDCCH for its
About Cell ID： paging period that allocated by system. UE wakes up from the IDLE
state in the specified paging period, demodulates PDCCH for
 In LTE protocol, the physical layer Cell ID comprises
monitoring paging. If paging is detected, PDSCH resources will be
two parts: Cell Group ID and ID within Cell Group. The demodulated to receive paging message.
latest version defines that there are 168 Cell Group IDs,
3 IDs within each group. So totally 168*3=504 Cell IDs
exist.
cell (1) (2)
N ID  3N ID  N ID
(1)
N ID
 (2) represents Cell Group ID, value from 0 to 167;
N ID
represents ID within Cell Group, value from 0
to 2.
 LTE Fundamentals 20

Physical Layer Procedure — SYN Sequences

 Page 21
Physical Layer Procedure — Random Access
Basic Principle of Random Access :
 Random access is the procedure of uplink
synchronization between UE and E-UTRAN.
 Prior to random access, physical layer shall receive
the following information from the higher layers:
 Random access channel parameters: PRACH
configuration, frequency position and preamble format,
etc.
 Parameters for determining the preamble root sequences
and their cyclic shifts in the sequence set for the cell, in
order to demodulate the random access preamble.
 Two steps in physical layer random access:
 UE transmission of random access preamble
 Random access response from E-UTRAN
Detail Procedure of Random Access:
 Physical Layer procedure is triggered upon request of a
preamble transmission by higher layers.
 The higher layers request indicates a preamble index, a
target preamble received power, a corresponding RA-RNTI
and a PRACH resource .
 UE determines the preamble transmission power is
preamble target received power + Path Loss. The
transmission shall not higher than the maximum
transmission power of UE. Path Loss is the downlink path
loss estimate calculated in the UE.
 A preamble sequence is selected from the preamble
sequence set using the preamble index.
 A single preamble is transmitted using the selected preamble
sequence with calculated transmission power on the
indicated PRACH resource.
 UE Detection of a PDCCH with the indicated RA-RNTI is
attempted during a window controlled by higher layers. If
detected, the corresponding PDSCH transport block is
passed to higher layers. The higher layers parse the
transport block and indicate the 20-bit grant.
RA-RNTI: Random Access Radio Network Temporary Identifier
 LTE Fundamentals 22

Radom Access — RA Categories

 LTE Fundamentals 23

RA Categories — Contention Based

 LTE Fundamentals 24

Followed Idle Mode Procedures — Cell

Selection and Reselection
• FULL LTE IDLE mode follows the attached file:

- Cell Sel. And Reselection follow a near approach as the prior networks
- They are based on multiple triggering conditions for issuing measurements’
Reports from UE side
-For Intra-Freq. measurements: if there are no any thresholds configured at eNB
And fed-back to UEs, Ues will always perform Intra-freq MRs
-For inter-Freq MRs: UEs had to have configured with Cell priority (Fed-back
in SIB info), and for the higher priority cells than serving ones: Ues will perform
Inter-freq MRs.
Page25

Cell Reselection Procedure - Smrized

• The signal strength of both serving cell and neighboring
cells varies with the movement of a UE and so the UE
needs to select the most suitable cell to camp on. This
process is called cell reselection
• Cell reselection process:
• Measurement start criteria
• Cell reselection criteria
Page26

Intra Frequency Measurement -- Smrized

• If the intra frequency measurement triggering threshold is
not configured, the UE performs intra frequency
measurements always.
• If the intra frequency measurement triggering threshold is
configured:
• Srxlev > SIntraSearch and Squal > SIntraSearchQ the UE dose not
perform intra frequency measurement
• Srxlev ≤SintraSearch or Squal ≤ SIntraSearchQ, the UE perform
intra frequency measurement
Page27

Priorities of Inter Frequency and Inter RAT

Cell Reselection
• Inter-frequency or inter-RAT measurement is frequency
priority based, depending on relative priority between serving
and neighbor cell, UE performs measurement according to
corresponding mechanism
• Note: For different frequency cell, we must configure the priority,
either be the same or different, otherwise, the UE can not perform
inter-frequency/inter-RAT cell selection
• The priorities of inter frequency and inter-RAT are classified
into two types:
• Absolute priority
• Static configuration
• Dedicated priority
• Temporarily configured by RRC
Page28

Inter Frequency/RAT Measurement

Criteria
• For the neighbors with higher priority
• The UE always perform inter frequency /RAT measurement
• For the neighbor with lower or equal priority
• If the threshold is not configured, the UE always perform inter
frequency/RAT measurement
• If the threshold is configured :
• When Srxlev > SNonIntraSearch and Squal > SNonIntraSearchQ, UE
does not perform inter frequency/RAT measurement
• When Srxlev ≤ SnonIntraSearch or Squal ≤ SNonIntraSearchQ UE
perform inter frequency /RAT measurement
Page29

Threshold Configuration for Intra-RAT

• MOD CELLRESEL
Page30

Inter-Frequency Measurement Gap

 LTE Fundamentals 31

THANKS
Ali Esswie