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UMTS Network Load Monitoring and Expansion Guide
UMTS Network Load Monitoring and Expansion Guide
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Revision History
Author
Document
Date Prepared by Reviewed by Approved by
Version
2011-3-15 R1.0 Qiao Bin, Jin
Zhengtuan, and Ma Wei Wang Zhenhai
Xu Yi
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ZTE Confidential Proprietary 2013 ZTE CORPORATION. All rights reserved. III
UMTS Network Load Monitoring and Expansion Guide Internal Use Only
Summary
Chapter Description
1 Overview Briefly introduces the background and the main contents of
high-load network monitoring and optimization.
2 High-Load Network Monitoring Describes the classification of UMTS network elements (NEs)
and the key performance indicators (KPIs) for network load
monitoring.
3 High-Load Network Optimization Describes the process of network load optimization.
4 High-Load Network Expansion Describes the thresholds, judgment, and implementation of
capacity expansion for high-load networks.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1 Overview ......................................................................................................... 1
1.1 Background ...................................................................................................... 1
1.2 Main Contents .................................................................................................. 2
FIGURES
TABLES
1 Overview
1.1 Background
To monitor and optimize the high load and performance of UMTS network is one of the
key tasks in the network operation and maintenance stage. With the increase of the
subscriber number and service application, especially with the rapid development of the
wireless broadband service, the network load will keep increasing. When the network
load reaches a certain level, the network resources will be congested and the network
performance will deteriorate, affecting the end users service experience.
To provide the users with high-speed access experience and keep the competitiveness
of the UMTS network, the operators should perform real-time monitoring to the load and
performance of the whole network, alarm the network element (NE) exceeding the load
threshold, take timely measures of optimization and expansion to meet the requirement
of service development.
In the narrow sense, the load refers to the traffic loaded by the network or channel. In the
broad sense, except for the network traffic, the operators need to consider the resource
utilization of the software and hardware of each NE in the network. The higher the
utilization rate is, the heavier the load will be.
Compared with the 2G network, the monitoring and management of the UMTS network is
more complex. The reasons are as follows:
The UMTS is a soft capacity system. Its capacity is not only constrained by the hard
resources such as the CE and Iub configuration bandwidth, but also constrained by the
soft resources such as the OVSF code, uplink interference, and downlink power. Subject
to the requirements for the network coverage and service quality, the system capacity is
not a fixed value.
UMTS is a hybrid multi-service system. The system capacity is different due to different
service structure and different service model, so we cannot simply use the traffic of a
certain service to monitor the system capacity.
The UMTS may use the hybrid carrier strategy of R99+HSPA. R99 and HSPA share the
system resources, making it more complex to monitor the capacity of R99 and HSPA.
The UMTS is a network focusing on the data service. To judge the data network
congestion, we cannot simply follow the processing of the traditional voice-centric
network, that is, we cannot judge the network congestion according to whether there is a
admission rejection, but should judge the network congestion by combining the HSPA
Based on the network management counter of RNC V3.09, this manual gives the
definition of the monitoring indicators of UMTS network load and the suggestions for the
monitoring threshold.
The high-load network monitoring and optimization guide shall apply to the
communication network in the UMTS commercial operation and maintenance phase.
As shown in Figure 1-1, the high-load network monitoring and optimization transversely
aim at three levels of NEs: the cell of radio access network (RAN), Node B and RNC.
Longitudinally, there are three phases: high-load network monitoring, high-load network
optimization and high-load network expansion, respectively corresponding to the three
parts of this guide.
Vertical
Part 1 corresponds to Chapter 2 of this guide, mainly describing the indicators needed to
be monitored for the network load. As shown in Figure 1-2, the network load monitoring of
WCDMA system mainly aim to three levels of NEs: the cell of wireless access network,
NodeB and RNC. Each NE corresponds to different RAN. Mainly involving the air
interface resources such as the code resource and power resource, the cell NE closely
relates to the users experience rate and focuses on the users feeling. The Node B NE
mainly involves the transmission resource and CE resource. According to the RNC
configuration, the RNC NE mainly involves the indicators such as the occupation of RCP
and CPU as well as the use of RUP and CE resources.
Yes
RNC expansion
Meet the RNC capacity
RNC-level monitoring, Software: Add licenses
expansion requirements Yes
analysis, and alarm Hardware: Add RUB or
or not?
RCB boards
No
Part 2 corresponds to Chapter 3 of this guide, mainly describing the optimization of the
high-load network performance. There are mainly 2 aspects: the high-load network
optimization process and common optimization methods. As shown in Figure 1-3, in the
optimization process of high-load network, you should optimize the RF and wireless
parameters according to the actual network situation. The wireless parameters
optimization mainly includes the parameters such as the handoff, congestion control,
load equalization, DRBC, power control and HSPA, so as to reduce the consumption of
various resources.
High-load NE
Cell-level NEs involve false load rises and
real load rises.
Vertical
RF optimization
Neighbor optimization, only for cell-level NEs
Parameter optimization
Part 3 corresponds to Chapter 4 of this guide, mainly introducing the high-load network
expansion. As shown in Figure 1-2, the high-load WCDMA network will be respectively
expanded in the three levels of cell, Node B and RNC. The content contains the
expansion analysis process, expansion criteria, expansion methods and implementation
details.
Reading guide: If you want to understand the high-load network optimization measures
given in this guide, please directly go to Chapter 3. If you want to understand the
expansion criteria and methods, please directly go to Chapter 4. Any question about the
counter or indicators, you can directly refer to Chapter 2 or understand by other means.
The NE level of WCDMA system can be classified into the RAN cell, Node B, RNC and
CN. We mainly focus on the load monitoring and evaluation of the three NE levels of the
RAN cell, Node B and RNC. For all NEs, we need to consider various scenarios of
service behaviors, find the reasonable monitoring indicators and set the monitoring
threshold, so as to perform the monitoring, alarm and load control.
For the same service behavior, different NE has different monitoring parameters. As to
the air interface, we mainly study the factors such as the cell throughput, single-user
throughput, downlink power, uplink interference and downlink code resource. As to the
NodeB, we mainly consider the utilization of hardware resources.
1. Cell level
The monitoring parameters of the NE in cell level mainly aim at the air interface,
such as the cell throughput, average throughput of HSDPA users, average
utilization of non-HSDPA carrier transmission power, average utilization of
non-HSDPA code resources and the uplink noise rise.
2. Node B level
3. RNC level
The RNC will also observe the traffic operation indicators of the existing network,
including the Erl, traffic, BHCA and the quantity of online users.
Expansion
Monitoring Indicator System 20110315.xls
Unlike the non-flexible resource and load of Node B and RNC, the cell-level load
monitoring indicators are the most complex, so following we will mainly introduce the
cell-level load monitoring indicators.
Average occupancy of cell code resources = Quantity of code resources occupied by all
cell services/Total number of code resources
It basically reflects the overall utilization status of the cell code resources.
To some extent, it reflects the utilization status of R99 service code resources. The
background network management can directly calculate the average availability of the
cell code resources and the average occupancy of the HSDPA code resources.
According to the two indicators, we can get the statistics formula of the average
occupancy of non-HSDPA code resources, as shown below:
For the HSDPA code channel, our system can perform dynamic adjustment according to
the R99 service requirement. When the R99 traffic grows, the system can dynamically
reduce the HSDPA code channels to be the minimum distribution value. So the average
occupancy of non-HSDPA code resources can also be expressed as:
For the hybrid carrier cell of R99+HSPA, the maximum code channel of R99 service is
affected by the configuration parameters of HSDPA code channel. When the quantity of
code channels that will be occupied by the R99 service exceeds the maximum of
available code channels of the R99 service, the R99 service will refuse to receive due to
insufficient DCH code resources.
Maximum of available code resources of R99 service = 256 Quantity of code channels
occupied by common channel Minimum of HS-PDSCH code channels 16 Quantity
of HS-SCCH code channels 2 Quantity of E-AGCH code channels 1 Quantity of
E-RGCH code channels 2
Among which, the quantity of code channels occupied by common channel, the minimum
of HS-PDSCH code channels, the quantity of HS-SCCH code channels, the quantity of
E-AGCH code channels and the quantity of E-RGCH code channels come from the
background network management configuration.
Suppose the code channel parameter configuration of the HSPA and common channel is
as shown in Table 2-1.
HS-PDSCH 16 8 at least
HS-SCCH 128 2
E-AGCH 256 1
E-RGCH 128 1
CPICH 256 1
PCCPCH 256 1
SCCPCH 64 1
PICH 256 1
AICH 256 1
We can see that the maximum of available code resources of R99 service = 256 8 8
16 4 1 2 = 113. Because the quantity of code resources occupied by common
channel is fixed and small, usually we can ignore it for calculation.
So, when the utilization of cell code resources is very high, and even a congestion of
code resource occurs, we suggest you reduce the minimum of HSDPA code channel to
be 1.
The average utilization of cell non-HSDPA carrier transmit power can be calculated by
the statistic indicators in the network management. Here is its definition:
Average utilization of cell non-HSDPA carrier transmit power =Total downlink transmit
power of cell non-HSDPA code / Total downlink available power of cell non-HSDPA
For the hybrid carrier cell of R99+HSPA, when it determines to control the acceptance of
the DCH based on downlink power, one of the determination conditions is:
Among which, NOHSDSCHPower is the Transmitted carrier power of all codes not used
for HS-PDSCH or HS-SCCH transmission reported by the NodeB.
Currently, the acceptance threshold of R99 is usually set to be 85%, that is, 85% of the
maximum transmit power of the cell. When the RNC determines to accept the DCH
based on downlink power, if there are multiple requests of establishing connection at the
determination time, the system will add the predictive power of all the newly-established
connections based on the existing NOHSDSCHPower, and then compare with the power
acceptance threshold. When the predictive power is bigger than the acceptance
threshold, the system will reject all the requests of establishing connection. If there are
many requests of establishing connection, the predictive power deltaP will be large and it
is easy to refuse to accept.
In WCDMA system, all the users share the same carrier, and the users are distinct from
each other by different spreading code and scrambling code. For the uplink, due to the
non-orthogonality of the user scrambling code, each user signal becomes a noise
(interference) to other user signals. Therefore, each signal is included in the broadband
interference background generated by other users. To access a call, the mobile station
power must be large enough to overcome the noise of other mobile stations in the
bandwidth.
The relationship between the uplink capacity and noise rise is as shown in Figure 2-1.
From the figure you can see that, there is a non-linear relationship between the NodeB
uplink noise rise and uplink capacity (load). When the uplink capacity (load) reaches a
certain threshold, the noise rise will increase sharply. Therefore, the UMTS radio network
planning is based on certain uplink load planning. Generally the uplink load is designed to
be 50%, corresponding to 3db of noise rise. When the uplink load is too large, both the
system uplink coverage and performance will obviously deteriorate due to the sharp
noise rise
The indicator of cell uplink noise rise cannot be calculated directly from the network
management. It formula is defined as follows:
Cell uplink noise rise = Average value of cell carrier received power System noise floor
Mainly from the perspective of the total HSDPA throughput, we use the average
throughput of HSDPA cell to evaluate whether the cell is busy, and determine whether
the cell needs to be expanded by considering the Average Throughput of HSDPA Single
User at the same time.
Average throughput of HSDPA cell = Amount of user data confirmed by HSDPA MAC.
The unit is Kb. It indicates the average throughput of HSDPA cell in the data transmission
time.
If the average throughout of HSDPA cell is small, you need to analyze whether it is
because of poor coverage or insufficient transmission, or because the service demand of
the cell user is small, such as QQ online service. If the small data amount of the user
scheduling is caused by poor coverage or insufficient transmission, you need to optimize
in the perspective of coverage so as to improve the overall cell throughput. Only when the
HSDPA cell average throughput is relatively large, you need to further assess the
Average Throughput of HSDPA Single User.
For the HSDPA data service, except for the traditional indicators such as call connection
rate and call drop rate, there is another more important indicator used to measure the
user experience, that is, user average download rate. When the user experience rate of
the HSDPA users is below expectations, we need to optimize and expand the network.
When the average experience rate of the HSDPA users cannot meet expectations,
except for the possible causes mentioned above that the network coverage is poor or the
transmission bandwidth is insufficient, there is another cause that too many users initiate
the data transmission at the same time. If the low HSDPA user rate is caused by too
many users initiating the data transmission at the same time, we need to optimize and
expand the network. HS-PDSCH is a shared physical channel, and the transmission
bandwidth is shared by all the HSDPA users. If too many users initiate the data
transmission at the same time, the real-time transmission rate of each HSDPA user will
reduce. Therefore, except for the indicator of HSDPA user real-time experience rate, the
system should also provide the indicator of real-time transmission HSDPA user quantity,
which is used to judge whether the low real-time transmission rate of each HSDPA user
is caused by too many HSDPA users initiating the data transmission at the same time.
Average throughput of HSDPA single user (Kbps) = Amount of user data confirmed by
HSDPA MAC/Data transmission time of HSDPA users
High-load network will cause many problems such as the access failure, handover failure,
call drop and HSPA low rate, badly affecting the user experience and thus needing to be
optimized or expanded urgently. Figure 3-1 shows the high-load network optimization
stage, that is, after the network load rise and before the network expansion. When the
network load is monitored to be high, we first need to optimize to reduce the network load.
If the load is still relatively high after the network optimization, we need to prepare for
expansion.
Vertical
The network load optimization process is as shown in Figure 3-2. Actually the
optimization of high-load network aims to the cell air interface resources. The cell load
rise can be solved by RF optimization and parameter optimization. The RF optimization
mainly aims to the coverage, neighbor cell and interference optimization, so as to reduce
the excessive resource consumption resulted from overshooting, pilot pollution and
high-proportion switching. The parameter optimization includes the switching threshold
optimization, control methods of congestion acceptance (refuse and preempt), load
control, DRBC, power control and HSPA related parameters, as well as the intra-system
and inter-system cell load equalization. These optimizations can not only reduce the cell
load, some optimization methods can also reduce the Node B and RNC load, such as the
switching and DRBC downspeeding. Relatively speaking, the load rise of Node B and
RNC belongs to the consumption of its own hardware resource.
Please note that, some optimization methods are especially for some kind of resource or
indicator, but may have a negative impact on another resource or indicator. For example,
by reducing the HSDPA code resource we can reduce the non-HSDPA code resource
utilization and R99 service congestion, but meanwhile the HSDPA service rate and user
experience will also be reduced.
High-load NE
Cell-level NEs involve false load rises and
real load rises.
Vertical
RF optimization
Neighbor optimization, only for cell-level NEs
Parameter optimization
We also suggest you pay attention to relevant factors such as the tariff, terminal, network
quality and publicity. When relevant strategies change, you should consider the
possibility of expanding the network in advance.
For the network expansion, you can begin with the network load monitoring, respectively
perform corresponding monitoring, analysis and alarm for each level of NE, and expand
the NEs meeting the expansion criteria by proper expansion methods. The expansion
analysis process is as shown in Figure 4-1.
Yes
RNC expansion
Meet the RNC capacity
RNC-level monitoring, Software: Add licenses
expansion requirements Yes
analysis, and alarm Hardware: Add RUB or
or not?
RCB boards
No
For the WCDMA system, the high-load network expansion needs to respectively aim to
three NEs of the RAN cell, Node B and RNC. The cell load level only reflects the load
status of the cell itself to some extent. A Node B can have many cells and the different
quantity of cell results in different load of Node B. If a Node B contains too many cells,
although the cell itself does not have too much load, the Node Bs load may exceed the
limit. Similarly, the RNC load is affected by the quantity of its Node B and cells. So you
need to assess all the three NEs, and formulate different expansion criteria and methods
correspondingly.
The expansion criteria mainly include the expansion threshold and expansion
assessment formula, and the expansion methods respectively correspond to the limit of
different NEs and resources.
Among the three NEs, the WCDMA system cell is the NE closest to the actual users and
the minimum unit used to assess the network load. The cell load and performance level
directly affects the user experience, so the cell load monitoring and assessment will be
the key point in our daily monitoring and assessment, and the cell expansion is also the
core content of the WCDMA network expansion.
As shown in Figure 4-2, the cell load decision focuses on the user experience, and
decides the cell load by combining the utilization of network resource indicators.
Optimization
High-load decision
Yes
Expansion
The indicators of assessing the user experience are mainly the data user experience rate
and cell resource congestion level. The network resources mainly refer to the air interface
code resource and power resource. For details please refer to the cell indicators
mentioned in Section 2.2.
The user experience is the most direct and effective reflection of the network load level.
In the past, the user experience was mainly assessed by some traditional indicators such
as the call connection rate and call drop rate. But for the 3G network, the increase of data
service users is an inevitable trend and the data service proportion will be bigger and
bigger. Therefore, the user experience of data service will also become the most
important factor to measure the 3G network load, and the best indicator to assess the
user experience of data service is the user download experience rate of data service.
According to the expansion principle of Focus on the user experience, we will regard
the HSDPA user average experience rate (throughput) as the core to assess the cell load,
and try to accurately assess the cell load by combining the air interface.
Each monitoring indicator of the cell load assessment has been set an expansion
indicator number. The expansion indicator SPI is a logical indicator, and the value can
only be 0 or 1. When the expansion indicator SPI reaches the threshold, the value will be
1, or else 0. We also provide corresponding expansion methods when each indicator
reaches the expansion threshold, for your reference.
Expansion
Alarm Expansion
Indicator Indicator Name Expansion Method
Threshold Threshold
No.
Average
Throughput of
SPI1 1 Mbps 512 Kbps
HSDPA Single
HSPA+/Multi-carrier/add
User
NodeB
HSDPA cell
SPI2 average 100 MB 150 MB
throughput
Non-HSDPA code
SPI4 resource average 60% 70% Multi-carrier/add NodeB
occupancy
Average
utilization of
Expand power
SPI5 non-HSDPA 60% 70%
amplifier/add NodeB
carrier transmit
power
Admission
rejection Set to be a
SPI8 proportion due to fixed 2% Multi-carrier/add NodeB
limited downlink value: 1
code resources
Admission
rejection Set to be a
Expand power
SPI9 proportion duo to fixed 2%
amplifier/add NodeB
limited downlink value: 1
power TCP
According to the threshold setting of the cell load monitoring indicator SPI and the cell
expansion assessment process, we can get the combination chart of the cell expansion
decision formula, as shown in Figure 4-3.
Yes Yes
The cell has a high network The cell has a high resource
resource utilization rate and a utilization rate and a high non-
high PS service load; user HSDPA service load; user No
False load rise
perception about PS service is perception about access is bad.
bad. Hence this cell is a high- Hence this cell is a high-load
load cell. cell.
Real load rise
Optimization
From above we can get the general formula of the high-load cell decision:
S_cell = SPI1 SPI2 + SPI4 SPI8 + SPI5 SPI9 + SPI6 (SPI4 + SPI5)
Formula description:
2. SPI1 SPI2 is mainly used to filter the high-load cell focusing on the data service,
that is, need to meet the requirements of low user rate and high cell throughput.
3. SPI4 SPI8 + SPI5 SPI9 + SPI6 (SPI4 + SPI5) is mainly used to filter the
high-load cell focusing on the non-HSDPA service. The purpose of SPI1 SPI2 is to
perform mutual correction of two counters. Two SPIs meeting the criteria can
basically determine that the cell is in a high-load state.
SPI6 (SPI4 + SPI5) means at least two indicators meet the criteria. There are two
causes, one is that the uplink may be interfered, and the other is that the automatic
noise floor update is false. So we use the two indicators of the code resource and
power resource to correct, so as to ensure the cells we filtered are really the cells
with relatively high load.
4. When S_cell > 0, it means that the cell enters a high-load state and needs to be
expanded, and we need to perform monitoring optimization and load assessment.
5. The bigger value of S_cell means the heavier load of the current cell. The minimum
of S_cell is 0 and the maximum is 5.
For different networks, the expansion thresholds may be different. Following is the brief
introduction to the threshold setting of each indicator.
As shown in Figure 4-4, for the cell with the CS traffic of the whole network in a certain
area greater than 1Erl, the average occupancy of non-HSDPA code resources reflects
the cell R99 traffic level to some extent, and is in proportional to the cell CS traffic. So in
the cell load assessment, when the indicator of average occupancy of non-HSDPA code
resources is used, it means the indicator of CS traffic is indirectly used too. The average
occupancy of non-HSDPA code resources not only reflects the occupancy of cell R99
code resources and the situation of refusing to accept, but also reflects the cell CS traffic
load level.
Figure 4-4 Relationship Between the Code Resource Utilization and Traffic
In some networks, when the average utilization of non-HSDPA carrier transmit power is
greater than 40%, there will be a situation of refusing to accept due to the limited
downlink power. It relates to the measurement and decision cycle of refusing to accept
2 ms. If too many services are accepted in 2 ms at the same time, it will cause the
situation of refusing to accept.
Figure 4-5 Relationship Between the Cell Carrier Transmit Power Utilization and TCP
Limited Proportion
Definition of uplink noise rise: Total average received power of cell uplink-RTWP NodeB
noise floor
Currently ZTE uplink acceptance control switch is closed, but the HSUPA scheduling is
controlled by the parameter of MaxRTWP. The default configuration of MaxRTWP is 6dB.
We suggest setting the expansion threshold of the uplink noise rise to be 8dB
(corresponding to 85% uplink loads). Theoretically, 6dB means the cell has 75% uplink
loads, obviously not indicating a high-load load. But 8dB corresponds to 85% uplink loads.
So we suggest setting the expansion threshold of the uplink noise rise to be 8dB and
setting the alarm threshold to be 6 dB.
4.2.1.3.4 HSDPA User Average Throughput & HSDPA Cell Average Throughput
When the real-time experience rate of the HSDPA users cannot meet expectations due to
the capacity reason, we need to expand the network capacity. The real-time experience
rate of HSDPA users can be directly obtained from the network management background.
Besides, the low HSDPA user rate may be caused by the poor coverage, insufficient
transmission bandwidth and heavy network load. We need to expand the network
capacity only when the low HSDPA user rate may be caused by the heavy network load.
Therefore, except for monitoring the Average Throughput of HSDPA Single User, we also
need to monitor the HSDPA cell average throughput, and use the two indicators to
determine whether the network capacity needs to be expanded.
When the Average Throughput of HSDPA Single User is less than 512 Kbps, we need to
make the next-step decision of the capacity monitoring.
The HSDPA cell average throughput indicates the service volume of cell data
transmission. The HSDPA cell average throughput is too low may be because the
application layer flow is not enough or the cell coverage is poor. In this situation, we
should not perform the expansion. Therefore, we suggest considering the expansion
when the HSDPA cell average throughput > 150 MB.
In general, when the Average Throughput of HSDPA Single User is less than 512 Kbps
and the HSDPA cell average throughput is greater than 150 MB, the cell capacity should
be expanded.
When the call congestion ratio is over 2%, the user experience will be badly affected.
Therefore, we set the alarm and expansion threshold of this KPI as 2%.
The NodeB expansion implementation rules mainly set the hour as the granularity. The
monitoring and assessment cycle is 1 week. Because each cell has different user
behavior and different busy hours, we recommend implementing 7 24 hour monitoring
mode. The implementation rules are as shown in Table 4-2.
Monitoring
Monitoring Mode 1 Monitoring Mode 2
Mode
Monitoring
Cell of the whole network Cell of the whole network
Object
Monitoring
Hour Hour
Granularity
Node B NE lies in the intermediate level of the 3-level NEs, mainly providing the
baseband resource pool for the cell and performing the data transmission of the cell. This
section mainly introduces the NodeB CE resource expansion.
The Node B expansion mainly inspects the shared resource utilization of the cell under
Node B, for example, the CE resource and transmission resource. This section mainly
introduces the CE resource.
The Node B CE resource load assessment is as shown in the table. An indicator number
SPI is set for each monitoring indicator. The expansion indicator SPI is a logical indicator
and its value can only be 0 or 1. When the indicator reaches the expansion threshold, the
value will be 1, or else 0. Meanwhile, we provide the expansion method corresponding to
each indicator reaching the expansion threshold. The expansion threshold and method
are as shown in Table 4-3.
Expansion
Alarm Expansion Expansion
Indicator Indicator Name
Threshold Threshold Method
No.
Average utilization of
SPI11 60% 70% Expand the
uplink NodeB CE resource
BPC board
Average utilization of
Expand the
SPI12 downlink NodeB CE 60% 70%
BPC board
resource
Maximum utilization of
Expand the
SPI14 downlink NodeB CE 80%% 90%
BPC board
resource
Set as a
Admission rejection rate of Expand the
SPI15 fixed 2%
uplink CE BPC board
value: 1
Set as a
Admission rejection rate of Expand the
SPI16 fixed 2%
downlink CE BPC board
value: 1
According to the expansion threshold setting shown in Table 4-3, we use the expansion
decision formula to assess the Node B load and expansion demand.
Formula description:
2. (SPI11+SPI3) SPI15 is mainly used to filter the uplink CE high-load cell, indicating
that the uplink average or maximum utilization is relatively high, and meanwhile the
uplink CE refuses to accept. If there is only high utilization but no CE admission
rejection, it means the indicator does not reach the expansion threshold. If there is
only admission rejection but no high utilization, it may be caused by uneven
distribution of resources.
When S_nodeb_CE > 0, it means the NodeB enters a high-load state and falls into our
monitoring scope for monitoring optimization and expansion assessment.
Greater value of S_nodeb_CE means greater Node B expansion demand. The minimum
of S_node_CE is 0 and the maximum can be 2.
Figure 4-6 Average Utilization Rates of Uplink and Downlink NodeB CE Resources in
Shapingba, Chongqing, China
Figure 4-7 Maximum Utilization Rates of Uplink and Downlink NodeB CE Resources in
Shapingba, Chongqing, China
The NodeB expansion implementation rules mainly set the hour as the granularity. The
monitoring and assessment cycle is 1 week. Because each NodeB has different user
behavior and different busy hours, we recommend implementing 7 24 hour monitoring
mode. The implementation rules are as shown in Table 4-4.
Monitoring
Monitoring Mode 1 Monitoring Mode 2
Mode
Monitoring
Cell of the whole network Cell of the whole network
Object
Monitoring
Hour Hour
Granularity
Monitoring
Monitoring Mode 1 Monitoring Mode 2
Mode
The IUB expansion also belongs to the second level of the radio network, responsible for
the data transmission. Its capacity constraint will directly affect each KPI.
The IUB resource load assessment is as shown in the table. The expansion indicator
number SPI is set for each monitoring indicator. The expansion indicator SPI is a logical
indicator and the value can only be 0 or 1. When the indicator reaches the threshold, the
value will be 1, or else 0. The corresponding expansion method is also provided here for
your reference when each indicator reaches the expansion threshold. The expansion
threshold and methods are as shown in Table 4-5.
Expansion
Alarm Expansion Expansion
Indicator Indicator Name
Threshold Threshold Method
No.
Maximum forward
SPI17 accepted bandwidth 80% 90%
proportion of IP Expand the
Maximum backward transmission.
SPI18 accepted bandwidth 80% 90%
proportion of IP
Average backward
Expand the
SPI20 accepted bandwidth 60% 70%
transmission.
proportion of IP
Maximum forward
Expand the
SPI21 accepted bandwidth 80% 90%
transmission.
proportion of ATM
Maximum backward
Expand the
SPI22 accepted bandwidth 80% 90%
transmission.
proportion of ATM
Average backward
Expand the
SPI24 accepted bandwidth 60% 70%
transmission.
proportion of ATM
For SPI1724 in the above table, we need to start the measurement on the OMCB for at
least 1 week, and then close.
According to the expansion threshold setting in the above table, we can use the
expansion decision formula to assess the IUB transmission load and the expansion
demand, as shown below:
Formula description:
When S_trans>0, it means the transmission enters a high-load state and falls into our
monitoring scope for monitoring optimization and expansion assessment.
A bigger value of S_nodeb means bigger expansion demand of the IUB transmission.
The minimum of S_trans is 0 and maximum is 8.
In a high-load state, the expansion threshold of the Iub interface uplink and downlink
transmission bandwidth utilization should be 70% of the total transmission bandwidth.
The IUB expansion implementation rules mainly set the hour as granularity, and the
monitoring and assessment cycle is 1 week. Because each NodeB user has different
behavior and different busy hour, we recommend implementing the 7 24 hour
monitoring, and the monitoring implementation rules are as shown in Table 4-6.
Monitoring
Monitoring Mode 1 Monitoring Mode 2
Mode
Monitoring
Cell of the whole network Cell of the whole network
Object
Monitoring
Hour Hour
Granularity
Monitoring
Monitoring Mode 1 Monitoring Mode 2
Mode
The RNC is at the highest level of the radio network, responsible for the work scheduling
and processing of NodeBs and cells in its charge.
In the perspective of software and hardware constraints, the RNC expansion can be
divided into RNC hardware expansion and RNC software expansion.
RNC hardware expansion refers to the expansion triggered by the constraint of RNC
hardware processing capability. The expansion can be performed by increasing the
hardware boards.
RNC software expansion means that the software license is close to or reaches the
committed capacity and thus the expansion is triggered. The expansion can be
performed by increasing the software licenses.
The RNC hardware expansion and software expansion may occur at the same time or
occur respectively. Their association depends on the project hardware configuration
mode and the software quotation mode. We need to monitor each project respectively
according to related parameters of the RNC hardware expansion and RNC software
expansion.
In the perspective of modeling configuration, the RNC expansion can be divided into
modeling expansion and non-modeling expansion.
The modeling expansion means that the RNC hardware and software use the modeling
configuration quotation. The expansion will be performed in the unit of model.
The non-modeling expansion means that the RNC hardware and software do not use the
modeling configuration quotation. The expansion will be performed in the unit of board.
The RNC hardware can be classified into the common hardware, capacity hardware and
interface hardware.
The common hardware mainly includes rack, frame and common board.
Rack: The rack expansion depends on the quantity of frame. Each 4 frames need 1
rack.
Frame: including the control frame, resource frame and exchange frame
The expansion of control frame depends on the increase amount of the control
plane processing board RCB. When there is the exchange frame, the main
control frame can be inserted 6 RCBs, and the rest can be inserted 14. When
there is no exchange frame, the main control frame can be inserted 2 RCBs
and the rest can be inserted 14.
The expansion of resource frame depends on the increase amount of the user
plane processing board RUB and the interface board. Each resource frame
can be inserted 15 RUBs and interface boards.
For the exchange frame, the system configures 1 exchange frame at most.
When there are more than 2 resource frames, the exchange frame must be
configured. When there are 2 or less resource frames, it is defaulted and
recommended to configure the exchange frame.
Common board: including the global processing board and system exchange board
Global processing boards: including ROMB, CLKG and SBCX. The quantity is
a fixed configuration and has nothing to do with the capacity, so usually there is
no issue of expansion. If no active and standby boards are divided at the
beginning, later we need to expand them to be active and standby according to
the operations requirement.
System exchange boards: including THUB, GUIM, UIMC, PSN and GLI.
Configuring a pair of THUB for the whole RNC is a fixed configuration. A pair of
GUIM is configured for each resource frame. A pair of UIMC is configured for
each control frame or exchange frame. A pair of PSN is configured for each
exchange frame. A pair of GLI is configured for every 2 resource frames.
The capacity hardware can be divided into the control plane processing board RCB and
the user plane processing board RUB.
The monitoring indicators of the hardware expansion of RNC capacity hardware resource
are as shown in Table 4-7.
Expand the
SPI33 RCP CPU average load 60% 70%
RCB board.
Expand the
SPI34 RCP CPU peak load 80% 90%
RCB board.
Expand the
NodeB quantity 140/pair of RCB
RCB board.
Expand the
Cell quantity 420/pair of RCB
RCB board.
For the NodeB quantity and cell quantity, we do not set the monitoring counter. When
expand the NodeB, we need to assess whether the RCB needs to be expanded.
For the utilization of RUB CE resources and the load of RCB CPU, we need to set the
monitoring indicators.
An expansion indicator number (SPI3134) is set for each monitoring indicator, and the
value can only be 0 or 1. When the indicator reaches the expansion threshold, the value
will be 1, or else 0.
According to the expansion threshold setting in the table, we can assess the RNC load
and expansion demand by the expansion decision formula, as shown below:
Formula description:
S_hard is the RNC expansion index, and the value can be 0, 1 and 2.
When S_hard = 0, it means neither the peak nor average value meets the criteria. So we
do not need to expand.
When S_hard = 1, it means the average value meets the criteria but the peak does not,
and the RNC enters a high-load state. So we need to expand the control plane or the
user plane.
When S_hard = 2, it means both the peak and average value meet the criteria, and the
expansion is urgent.
Except for the monitoring indicators mentioned above, we can also set some observation
indicators to observe the actual network service state when the hardware is close to or
reaches the expansion threshold, as shown in Table 4-8.
There are several factors causing the interface hardware expansion, including:
1. Capacity
3. For example, in a Unicom project, the Iu/Iub interfaces in many provinces share the
IP interface board in the beginning, later it is required that the interface boards of
Iu/Iub interfaces should be separated. Therefore, we need to separately expand the
interface boards without changing the capacity hardware. This kind of expansion is
resulted from the operators requirement and does not need any expansion
foundation. We just need to re-calculate the flow of each interface after separation.
5. For example, the ATM interface boards are used previously, now we need to
increase the IP interface boards because the network develops to the all-IP
technology. This kind of expansion is resulted from the operators requirement and
does not need any expansion foundation. We just need to re-calculate according to
the new interface board algorithm.
7. Many kinds of interface boards are related to the quantity of NEs and ports. For
example, the interface boards will be increased by increasing the NodeB quantity,
increasing the E1 quantity for each NodeB, increasing the Iur quantity, or increasing
the Iu-flex function. In this case, we need to re-calculate the quantity of interface
boards according to the new NodeB/port demands.
For Case 2 to Case 5 mentioned above, we do not need to set the monitoring indicators,
and perform the expansion correspondingly when it is necessary. For Case 1, we need to
monitor the bandwidth usage of the interface boards. The monitoring parameters are as
shown in Table 4-9.
Expand the
Average bandwidth utilization in the
70% 80% ATM interface
ATM interface board transmit direction
board
Expand the
Average bandwidth utilization in the
70% 80% ATM interface
ATM interface board receiving direction
board
The RNC software expansion is closely related to the quotation means of software
feature. Each project has different quotation unit of the software feature, and in the same
project, different software has different quotation unit.
Some projects and some features are quoted in the units of NodeB quantity and cell
quantity. If the NodeB quantity and cell quantity exceed the quotation quantity, we need
to perform the software expansion.
For example, in one project, the RNC hardware can support 210 cells and has 100 cells
actually, and the software feature is quoted 100cells. Then, the increase of cell quantity
will trigger the software expansion. When there are almost 210 cells, we need to trigger
both the software expansion and hardware expansion at the same time.
In some projects, some features are quoted in the unit of NodeBs CE. So we need to
monitor the CE operating indicators of all the NodeBs, and should trigger the software
expansion when the indicators exceed the quotation unit. (For the monitoring indicators
please refer to CE Monitoring Indicators of NodeB)
In some projects, some features are quoted in the unit of Erl and flow. So we need to
monitor the indicators of Erl and flow, and should trigger the software expansion when
the indicators exceed the quotation unit. (For the monitoring indicators, please refer to
RNC Hardware Expansion Observation Indicators.)
For example, in one project, the RNC hardware configuration is 250 Mbps and software
is quoted 100 Mbps. When the flow indicator of existing network exceeds 100 Mbps, we
need to expand the software license, that is, to quote the software feature for the
increased flow. When the flow is almost 250 Mbps, we need to perform the hardware
expansion.
For both the software expansion and hardware expansion, there are two methods:
modeling expansion and non-modeling expansion. To use which method depends on
whether the modeling method is used in the preliminary software and hardware
configuration quotation.
For the software expansion, the different between the modeling expansion and
non-modeling expansion only lies in the expansion granularity. The modeling expansion
must be based on the model granularity.
For the hardware expansion, except for different expansion granularity, the difference
between the modeling expansion and non-modeling expansion also lies in whether the
user plane, control plane, and interface board are bound.
If the non-modeling method is used, the control plane, user plane and interface board can
be expanded respectively. For example, in one project, if the RCP CPU is monitored to
be a little bit high-load but other indicators are normal, we only need to expand the RCB
and do not need to add the RUB or interface board. Similarly, if the user plane and
interface board are monitored to be load-rising, we can also expand the RUB or interface
board separately.
If the modeling method is used, the control plane and user plane boards need to be
linked according to the model. In some projects, the interface board is also contained in
the model, so we need to link the control plane, user plane and interface board. For
example, in one project, if the RCP CPU is monitored to be a little bit high-load but other
indicators are normal, we need to expand the whole model to the upper capacity level but
not only to expand the RCB.
When the average utilization of RUP CE resources reaches 70% and the average load of
CPU reaches 70%, it means the RNC becomes high-load and needs to be monitored and
assessed for expansion.
In the WCDMA network, the RNCs reflection during busy hours is relatively obvious and
uniform, so we can monitor the RNC load in two ways, as shown in Table 4-10.
Monitoring
RNC of the whole network RNC of the whole network
Object
Monitoring
Hour Hour
Granularity
Monitoring
A week (7 24) A week (busy hours of each day)
Cycle
Expansion
If in 1 week, S_hard 1, N 10, If in 1 week, S_hard 1, N 3,
Trigger
perform the capacity expansion. perform the capacity expansion.
Condition