GSM

Mobile Computing
IT644

GSM System Architecture

Network Subsystem
MSC ??

Radio Subsystem
BTS, BSC

Operation Support Subsystem

GSM System Hieararchy

GSM Network
MSC Region
Location Area

BSC

BSC

Location Area

..
...
. Area
Location

MSC R.
.
.
.
.
.
MSC R.

Operations and Maintenance Centre

OMC
G MSC

BTS

BSC

MSC
Home Location Register

HLR

BSC
VLR

BTS
MS

BTS
MS

Visitor Location Register

EIR Equipment Identity Register

AVC

Authentication centre

The Mobile Station (MS)

Comprises :
Mobile Equipment
SIM (Subscriber Identity Module ??)

Other Identification :
International Mobile Station Equipment Identity (IMEI)
International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI)
Mobile Subscriber ISDN Number (Mobile Telephone No.)

Radio Network
Base Subsystem Controller ? (BSC)
- Handles essential control and protocol intelligence.
- Handover is executed at the BSC.

Base Transceiver System ? (BTS)

- Is a high frequency Transmitter/Receiver.
- Handles error protection; coding/decoding for the radio
channel.

Frequency Channels in GSM

Uplink frequency band

: 890 - 915 MHz

Downlink frequency band : 935 - 960 MHz
124 channels (of 200 kHz each) in each band. ??
Each channels has a TDMA structure with 8 timeslots.
( => upto 8 users per freq. channel )
960 Mhz
124

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

935 Mhz

TDMA structure of
each channel

3 4

Downlink

Delay

So the MS does not have to Transmit and

Receive at the same time instance!

Uplink

Logical Channels
Traffic Channels (TCH)

Signaling Channels
Broadcast Channel (BCH)
Common Control Channel (CCH)
Dedicated/Associated Control Channel (DCCH/ACCH)

Note: These logical channels are then mapped onto Physical channels.
A GSM Physical channel comprises a particular timeslot on a given freq. Channel.

Signalling channel contd. ....

BCH :
Broadcast Control Channel (BCCH)
Frequency Correction Channel (FCCH)
Synchronization Channel (SCH)
CCH :
Random Access Channel (RACH)
Paging Channel (PCH)
D/ACCH
Stand-alone Dedicated Control Channel (SDCCH)
Slow Associated Control Channel (SACCH)

Traffic channel structure for full rate coding

TDMA
slots

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

1 2

5 6

9 10 11 12 13 14

26

TDMA Frames
on a given channel
Traffic
Signaling (S)

S-contains information about the signal strength in neighboring cells

Traffic channel structure for half rate coding

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

1 2

5 6

9 10 11 12 13 14

26

Burst for one user

1 2

5 6

Burst for another user

26

Why 26 burst Traffic Channel?

Mobile needs to send information about signal
strength from surrounding cells to the network.
Capacity required to send measurement info is
1/24 the capacity required to send voice!

Signaling Channel Control Channel

Associated Control Channel
Slow Associated Control Channel

Adaptive Frame Synchronization

Timing Advance:
MS advances its burst transmission by a time corresponding
to round trip time.
The delay is quantiled as a 6 bit number.
=> 64 steps (0-63); each step advances the Timing by one
bit duration ie 3.7 ms.
64 steps allows compensation over a maximum propagation
time of 31.5 bit periods ie 113.3 ms ( => a maximum distance
of ~ 35 km)

Timing Advance : How it works.

1

|
|
|
One way
|
Propagation ||
delay
|

|
| | 1
| |
| | |
|
|
|

|
|
|
|
1

(Sent by BS on
down link)

Two way propagation

delay

(received by BS on
up link)

8 (received by MS on

down link)

|
|
|

(Sent by MS on up link)

Transmission Bursts

Normal Burst
Synchronization Burst
Frequency Correction Burst
Dummy Burst
Access Burst

Control Channel
Functions:
To help the MS find the control channels. ??
To provide information about
- voice and control channel repetition cycle.
- parameters in the cell.
- surrounding cells.
- paging.
To allow random access attempts by the MS.

The Downlink Control Channel

51 cycle burst (2x26 -1)
Third burst on the control channel provides content
information.
Basic structure of control channel :
FSxxx xxxxx FSxxx xxxxx FSxxx xxxx ....
F: Frequency Correction Channel
(occurs every 10th burst)
S: Synchronization Channel

TDMA Bursts in GSM

FB

SB

142 fixed bits

39
data

Burst

39
data

26 bit
Training seq

Dummy 3
Burst
Acce
ss

64 bit
Training seq

41 bit
36 data 3
Training seq

8.25

8.25

8.25

68.25

Normal Burst
Tail bit

57
Data bits

26 bit
Training seq

Stealing Flags

Fig.

57
Data bits

8.25
3
Bit GP

S B B B
F

S B B B
F

S B B B

R R R R
C C C C
D D D

Frequency
synchronization
Time
synchronization
BCCH

Request
(Random access)
Grant

Full Rate Speech Coding

Coder for 20ms segments - 120 bits at the output.
13 Kbps.

Unequal error protection:

Out of 260 bits
- 182 bits are protected.
- 78 bits are not protected.

Error Coding
Class 1a - 3 parity bits from 50 bits.
Class 1b - 132 bits are not parity checked,
but fed to convolutional encoder.
Class 2 - 78 bits are not protected.
78

182

A Block Encoder (53, 50)

G(D) = 1 + D+ D3
SW

D
data

+
First 50 bits

Last 3 parity bits

1 - 50 clock cycles, SW closed

51 - 53 clock cycles, SW open

Convolutional Encoder
K- constraint length
R- rate of code
K storage location

G0 = d4 + d3 + 1
G1 = d4 + d3 + d + 1

k=5
r=2/1

Parity
bits

Class 1a
50 bits

Class 1b
132 bits

Class 2
78 bits
Tail bits

50

R=1/2 k=5;

132

378

78

78

456 bits
456 bits in 20 ms ~ 456/0.02 = 22.8 kbps

Interleaving
1. Block Interleaving:
Code words are written line by line to a matrix
and read column by column.??
8 (col) * 57 (row) matrix
2. Diagonal Interleaving
1

2
5

3
6

Discontinuous Transmission
On an average speech actually lasts only 50% of
the time.
So transmitter is kept off whenever there is no
speech.
This reduces co-channel interference and saves
battery power.
Voice Activity Detector (VAD) is used at the
transmitter, and Comfort Noise Generation (CNG)
is used at the receiver.

VAD
Background noise is stationary over relatively long periods.
Measure the deviations from the spectral characteristics of
the background noise.

CNG
Comfort noise characteristics are matched to the transmitted
noise.