CQI Optimization Guideline

Agenda

What Is CQI

What is contributing Bad and Good CQI

Parameter setting to improve CQI

Hardware Configuration Setting to improve CQI

Sample analysis CQI Improvement

What Is CQI ?
CQI stands for Channel Quality Indicator. As the name implies, it is an indicator carrying the information on how good/bad the
communication channel quality
How UE can measure CQI ? This is the most unclear topic to me. As far as I know, there is no explicit description in any standard on
the mechanism by which the CQI is calculated, but it is pretty obvious that the following factors play important roles to CQI
measurement.
• signal-to-noise ratio (SNR)
• signal-to-interference plus noise ratio (SINR)
• signal-to-noise plus distortion ratio (SNDR)
What is contributing Bad and Good CQI

As mentioned earlier, the main criteria for UE to determined CQI value is SNR, but the exact mapping between the measured SNR
and CQI may vary a little depending on each modem manufacturer, but overall correlation between CQI and SNR would be similar.
Every modem manufacturer would keep their own mapping table in their physical layer protocol stack but in most case the venders
would not open those tables in public. Fortunately, I found a data from Ref [3] as follows. This example would give you a concrete
insight about CQI determination.

•111 Tx Mode 0 re-tx:TM1, Number of Tx Antenna = 1, Number of Rx Antenna = 1, HARQ Max retransmission = 0
•111 Tx Mode 3 re-tx:TM1, Number of Tx Antenna = 1, Number of Rx Antenna = 1, HARQ Max retransmission = 3
•222 Tx Mode:TM2, Number of Tx Antenna = 2, Number of Rx Antenna = 2
•322 Tx ModeTM3, Number of Tx Antenna = 2, Number of Rx Antenna = 2
•342 Tx Mode:TM3, Number of Tx Antenna = 4, Number of Rx Antenna = 2
CQI Measured in Real Network
The final goal of designing the concept of CQI and implementing it in such a
complicated (confusing way) is to achieve the least amount of error and the best
possible rate of throughput. There are many factors influencing the throughput and
each of the factors would have some kind of correlations with other factors. In Lab
test, it is relatively easy to figure out those correlations since you can control those
factors (parameters) as fitting the best for analysis, but in live network it is not always
that easy to figure out those correlations because most of those factors (parameters)
changes dynamically. So the live network test result would not be easily explainable
but I think it always good to have some level of experience with live network test
result.
General rule of thumb for the correlation between CQI and throughput can be
summarized as follows.
• High throughput does not necessarily mean high CQI. (High throughput depends
not only on CQI, but also on transport block size (Number of RB and MCS. Even
when CQI is high, eNB may assign small resources due to various other factors)
• Low throughput does not necessarily mean low CQI. (The reason is same as
above)
• With low CQI, it is for sure that you cannot achieve the maximum throughput. So,
it is very likely that you would see low CQI when you see throughput drop in live
network test.
Parameter setting to improve CQI
Parameter that can improve CQI is Transmission mode in MIMO. Here is explanation every Transmission
mode hence with change TM Mode can Improve CQI
• Multi user MIMO.

TM 1 •Single antenna port; port 0

•1 TX antenna transmitting always on port 0 TM 5 • Multiple antennas transmitting to different UEs in the
cell.
• Increase sector capacity.

• Closed-loop Rank=1 precoding.

•Transmit diversity.
TM 2 •Multiple antennas transmit same signal.
•Improves SINR.
TM 6 • Beamforming.
• UE signals back the suitable precoding for the
beamforming operation.

•Open loop spatial multiplexing.

• Single Antenna port; port 5.
TM 3 •Multiple antennas transmitting different signals.
•No feedback from the UE used.
•Improves user data rate.
TM 7 • Beamforming.
• UE specific reference signals are generated for feedback.

•Closed Loop spatial multiplexing.

• 2 Antenna ports; port 7 and 8.

TM 4
•Multiple antennas transmitting different signals.
•Feedback from the UE used.
•Improves user data rate.
TM 8 • Dual Stream Beamforming.
• UE specific reference signals are generated for feedback.
 Parameter setting to improve CQI

Close Loop MIMO

ZTE
Parameter Existing Parameter Proposed Parameter
Intra Trans mode Adaptation ( 0 )
FlagSwiMode Actual only TM2 and TM3 TM4 TM2 (32)

NOKIA
Parameter Existing Parameter Proposed Parameter
dlMimoMode Dynamic Open loop MIMO Close Loop MIMO

Open loop MIMO transceivers adjust their transmission based on received (reference signal) measurements. This assumes no rapid feedback technique is available from the UE receiver
back to the eNodeB transmitter. Unfortunately, in open loop operation, the transmitter receives no feedback regarding antenna port operation or signal strength in the forward direction.
Closed loop MIMO supports a feedback loop describing eNodeB transmitter operation and UE recommendations. Both the eNodeB and UE contain a codebook which describes possible
RF parameters, for example, the phase shift between antenna ports. In closed loop MIMO, the UE describes eNodeB transmitter operation by returning an index into the shared codebook.
Closed loop operation uses the following steps.
1. The eNodeB transmits a DL pilot channel as a reference signal on all antenna ports.
2. he UE evaluates various codebook options that specify the RF parameters.
3. The UE transmits its recommendations in the form of a codebook index to the eNodeB.
4. The eNodeB adjusts its DL transmission to the UE based on the recommended parameters.
Result after Parameter change

RESULT

CQI, MCS, DL THP,DL USER

THP Improve. Followed by
increasing DL volume. Another
KPI like RACH, RRC, Erab-Drop,
HOSR, UL THP, UL Volume
relative maintain
Normal Hardware Configuration (ZTE TDD 8T8R FDD 2T4R Colo)

Number of Hardware
1 system module
3 Radio Module FDD
3 Radio Module TDD
12 Port Antenna Config per sector
Normal Hardware Configuration (ZTE FDD Only 2T4R)

Number of Hardware
1 system module
3 Radio Module FDD
4 Port Antenna Config per sector
Normal Hardware Configuration (ZTE TDD Only 8T8R)

Number of Hardware
1 system module
3 Radio Module TDD
8 Port Antenna Config per sector
Normal Hardware Configuration (NOKIA FDD Only 2T4R)

TXRX
RX
TXRX
RX
TXRX
RX
TXRX
RX
TXRX
RX
TXRX
RX

Normal FDD Only site consist of

2 FXCA + 1 FSMF + 4 Port antenna / Sector
Normal Hardware Configuration (NOKIA TDD Only 4T4R)

TXRX
TXRX
TXRX
TXRX

TXRX
TXRX
TXRX
TXRX

TXRX
TXRX
TXRX
TXRX
Normal TDD Only site consist of
3 FZNI + 1 FSMF + 2 FBBA + 4 Port antenna /
Sector
Sample Improvement

BEFORE AFTER

User < 1.5 Km

User > 1.5 Km

User < 300 m
User < 500 m
Min ISD (m)

User < 1 Km
Avg ISD (m)
H Antenna

Cell Name
MRBTS ID
Direction
Sector ID

PRB Utill
CQI Improve After
Cell ID
M Tilt

Etilt

CQI
Coverage optimization
ZJKT_4902-2 17 120 595902 32 ZJKT_4902-32 2 5.98 77.7 313 263 2 48 70 92.5 8
Cell ID AFTER BEFORE Delta Improvement Percentage Improvement
Result ZJKTDM6165-32[595902][32] 8.285 5.955 2.33 39.1%
Sample Improvement

BEFORE AFTER

User < 1.5 Km

User > 1.5 Km

User < 300 m
User < 500 m
Min ISD (m)

User < 1 Km
Avg ISD (m)
H Antenna

Cell Name
MRBTS ID
Direction
Sector ID

CQI Improve After

PRB Utill
Cell ID
M Tilt

Etilt

CQI
Coverage optimization
NJKT_0205-2 26.5 120 155205 32 NJKT_0205-32 7 6.28 51.9 451 281 2 11 56 98.4 2
Cell ID AFTER BEFORE Delta Improvement Percentage Improvement
Result  NJKTFM0205-32[155205][32] 8.35 6.44 1.91 29.7%
Let’s discuss!
Thank you