MOBILE BROADBAND WIRELESS ACCESS IEEE 802.16 vs 802.20 by, Janahan Gnanachandran Venkata Prashanth Reddy Bonthu.

. ABSTRACT: This article provides a survey of Mobile Broadband Wireless Access which discusses the emerging IEEE 802.16 and IEEE 802.20 standards. It gives an introduction with the purpose and scope of those standards. The technical aspects brief the system architecture, Physical layer and Medium Access Control layer details of both the standards. Finally, the differences between the standards are discussed. INTRODUCTION: The IEEE 802.16 working group on broadband wireless access had developed IEEE standard 802.16 for point to multi point Broadband Wireless transmission and optional Mesh topology broadband wireless access systems in the 2-66 GHz band. Two bands of spectrum are used. 1. 10 66 GHz - with only a Line Of Sight (LOS) capability because of short wavelengths as addressed by the standard that evolved in 2001. 2. 2-11GHz as in the IEEE 802.16a, published in 2003, is a standard for Non Line of Sight. Due to longer wavelengths LOS is not necessary for the physical environment in the 2 11 GHz bands. The MBWA study group which was formed in 2002 concluded the study that 802.16 and MBWA addressed the interest of two different markets. The IEEE 802.20 was developed to support high speed data services and to support full user mobility. 802.20 MBWA is a Mobile Fi which increases the coverage and mobility than existing 802.11 and 802.16, and sits on existing cellular towers, promising the same coverage area as a mobile phone system with the speed of a Wi-Fi connection [1]. It can provide a high speed data rate of 20 Mb/s. The packetbased air interface access of MBWA helps the transport of IP-based services to enable the implementation on MBWA networks worldwide. IEEE working group concluded five necessary criteria for IEEE 802.20. They are Broad market potential, Compatibility, Distinct identity, Technical feasibility and Economic feasibility. No projects support full vehicular mobility at high speed data rates more than 802.20 does. SCOPE AND PURPOSE: The scope of IEEE Standard 802.16 is to specify the Medium Access Control (MAC) layer and the Physical (PHY) Layer of the air interface of fixed Point-to-Multipoint Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) systems. 802.16 is a standard used in the 10-66GHz band. This standard was developed to support different environments of operation by structuring the MAC Layer to support multiple Physical Layer specifications. IEEE Standard 802.16a is from the 802.16 family and is designed to support communications in the 2-11 GHz band. 802.16a specifies the air interface of point to multi point and optional Mesh topology broadband wireless access systems. With specified quality of service (QoS) access to data, voice and video services can be achieved using this standard. The MAC layer in this standard too follows the structured architecture to support different physical layer specifications (different environments of operation). IEEE Standard 802.16e is an enhancement to 802.16 and 802.16a to support subscriber stations moving at vehicular speeds. This standard specifies a system for fixed and mobile broadband wireless access. Operational bands are licensed bands below 6 GHz. The mobile subscriber stations are the huge improvement over its parent standards (802.16 and 802.16a) and make it to support Mobile Broadband Access (MBWA). The scope of IEEE 802.20 is to develop a specification for the PHY and MAC layers of an air interface for interoperable packet-data mobile broadband wireless access systems which works licensed frequency bands 3.5 GHz and below, supports 1 Mbps data rate per user, Supports vehicular mobility classes up to 250 Km/h, covers cell sizes commensurate with ubiquitous metropolitan area networks, and targets spectral efficiencies, sustained user data rates and numbers of active users significantly higher than achieved by existing mobile sys-

tems [ IEEE 802.20 WG, PAR Form, IEEE 802.20 PD-02, Dec]. It can provide a worldwide implementation of cost effective, spectrum efficient, always on and interoperable mobile broadband wireless access systems This satisfies the need of ubiquitous and mobile internet access, transparent support of Internet applications, and access to intranet services of an enterprise. Mobile-fi fills the performance gap between the existing high datarate low mobility services in 802 and the high mobility cellular networks. TECHNICAL ASPECTS: 802.16: The IEEE Standard 802.16 wireless link has a base station which connects to different subscriber stations. The base station is provided with a sectorized antenna which is capable of handling multiple sectors. There is a down link and an uplink between the base station and the subscriber station provided for communication between them. Several subscriber stations that connect to a network communicate through the Base station. Base station transmits the signals/data to subscriber stations on a point to multipoint basis. All stations receive the same transmission within a given frequency channel and antenna sector. In the downlink, it is Base station which is the only transmitter operating. Hence the base station does not have to coordinate with any other station to transmit in the downlink. It broadcasts to all the stations within the frequency or sector with an address related to the receiver and all the stations receive/process/accept messages addressed to them. In the other direction, uplink, the user stations share the uplink to the base station on a demand basis. On the basis of the service the service stations may be granted/issued rights to transmit continuously or may be granted rights to transmit for a particular interval of time depending on the request from the user. The base stations issues the rights to transmit to the subscriber stations. 802.16 and 802.16a : Physical Layer: The Physical layer has been designed to support vast range of environments in the 10 66 Ghz band. To follow a flexible spectrum usage, Time Division Duplex and Frequency Division Duplex configurations are supported along with the burst transmission format. The uplink is based on TDMA(Time Division Multiple Access) and DAMA(Demand Assign Multiple Access). The uplink is divided into multiple time slot for different users. The number of time slots assigned to a particular user is determined by the MAC in the Base Station.. The down link channel is based on TDM with information about and for the subscriber stations attanched to a stream of data and broadcast over a channel and received by all the stations in the sector. 802.16e Physical Layer : The Physical layer of IEEE Standard 802.16e is a modification to the 802.16 and 802.16a to support mobile subscriber stations. Designed to support bands in the range 2 6GHz. Has high efficiency data uplinks and downlinks and refers to a low latency architecture. 802.16e uses Scalable OFDMA to carry data, supporting channel bandwidths of between 1.25 MHz and 20 MHz, with up to 2048 sub-carriers. It supports adaptive modulation and coding, so that in conditions of good

signal, a highly efficient 64 QAM coding scheme is used, whereas where the signal is poorer, a more robust BPSK (Binary Phase Shift Keying) coding mechanism is used. In intermediate conditions, 16 QAM and QPSK can also be employed. Other PHY features include support for Multiple In Multiple Out (MIMO) antennas in order to provide good NLOS (Non-line-of-sight) characteristics (or higher bandwidth) and Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request(HARQ) for good error correction performance. OFDMA - Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access Multiplexing is a technique that divides the channel into multiple orthogonal sub channels. In this the input data stream is divided into several sub streams of a lower data rate (increased symbol duration) and each sub stream is modulated and simultaneously transmitted on a separate sub channel. Hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ)

Adjusts automatically to channel conditions Adds redundancy only when needed Receiver saves failed transmission attempts to help future decoding Every transmission helps increase probability of success

MAC LAYER The Mac Layer comprises of 3 sub layers. The service specific Convergence sublayer (CS) provides any transformation or mapping of external network data, required through the CS service access point (SAP) , into MAC SDUs (Service Data Units) received by MAC Common Part Sublayer (CPS) through MAC SAP. This includes classifying external network SDUs and associating the proper MAC Service flow identifier (SIFD) and connection Identifier (CID).Multiple CS specifications are provided for interfacing with various protocols. The MAC CPS provides the core MAC functionality of system access, bandwidth allocation, connection establishment n connection maintenance. It receives data from various CS through MAC SAP, classifies ti particular MAC Connections. The MAC also contains a separate security sublayer providing authentication, secure key exchange, and encryption [*]....802.16-2004. The Medium Access Layer is Connection Oriented. The fundamental premise of the MAC of the

MAC Layer architecture is the Quality of Service (QoS) which is provided via the service flows. Unidirectional flow of packets is provided with a set of QoS parameters and applies to both downlink (DL) and uplink (UL). The Service Specific Convergence sublayer provides Interface to higher layer protocols, classifies incoming etc. MAC Common Part sublayer includes the Core MAC Layer functions Scheduling, Connection, Maintenance, Fragmentation) and the QoS Control. The Privacy sublayer includes the functionalities like Encryption, Authentication and Secure Key Exchange.

802.20 System Architecture of 802.20: An IEEE 802.20 MBWA has to provide non-line-of-sight outdoor to indoor service as well as outdoor coverage. The system should be designed to achieve functions at a high user level and full mobility. Throughput is increased and higher overall spectral efficiency is enabled in order to maximize the coverage. The base station should also support antenna diversity, but its not mandatory. The design of IEEE 802.20 standard should consider a clear separation of functionality in the system between the user, data, and control. The responsibilities of PHY and MAC layers should be defined clearly. The MAC layer should be optimized to support a specific PHY implementation. If more than one PHY implementation is to be used, the MAC layer should be designed so that it has a PHY-specific layer as well as a more general part [IEEE 802.20 WG, System Requirements for IEEE 802.20 MBWA systems- Version 14, IEEE 802.20]. 802.20 Physical Layer: The physical (PHY) layer of 802.20 comprises two duplex modes: Time Division Duplex (TDD) and Frequency Division Duplex (FDD), two forward link hopping modes: Symbol Rate Hopping and Block-Hopping, two synchronization modes: Semi Synchronous and Asynchronous, and two multi-carrier modes: Multi-Carrier On and Multi-Carrier Off. Modulation uses OFDM with QPSK, 8PSK, 16QAM, and 64QAM modulation formats [1]. Air Interface characteristics of PHY layer When characteristics of PHY portion of the air interface is considered, the channel bandwidth (for FDD) should be of the paired spectrum variety, consisting of two 1.25 MHz channels that use FDD. The system should have the ability to support six or more sectors per cell yet should be able to scale downward in order to accommodate a more typical load of three sectors per cell [1]. A Doppler tolerance of greater then 400 Hz is needed in order to satisfy the requirement for full vehicular mobility. At a carrier frequency of 2 GHz, the system will be able to support a Doppler tolerance of 400 Hz, thus enabling support of vehicular speeds at 228 km/h. A frequency reuse

factor of one or less is needed so that the same frequencies can be reused in all cells and sectors. Through the employment of directed adaptive antennas, it may be possible to use the same frequency band more than once in the same cell or sector [IEEE 820.20 WG, Desired characteristics for an MBWA air interface, Mar, 2003].

Figure 1. 802.20 layering architecture 802.20 MAC Layer: The MAC layer of 802.20 consists session, convergence, security, and lower MAC functions. The lower MAC sub layer controls operations of data channels: Forward Traffic Channel and Reverse Traffic Channel [IEEE P802.20-D1, Draft standard for MWBA.]. It includes control channel MAC protocol, access channel MAC protocol, shared signaling MAC protocol, forward traffic channel MAC protocol, reverse control channel MAC protocol, and reverse traffic channel MAC protocol. Forward- and reverse-link transmissions are divided into units of superframes, which are further divided into units of PHY frames. FDD and TDD superframe timing are used. An FDD forward-link superframe consists of a superframe preamble followed by several forward frames, and an FDD reverse-link superframe consists of several reversed frames. A TDD forward-link superframe consists of a superframe preamble and several forward frames, and a TDD reverse-link superframe consists of several reversed frames. The default access channel MAC protocol provides an access terminal to transmit by initial access or handoff via sending an access probe. After receiving the access probe, the network responds with an Access Grant [1]. Air Interface characteristics of MAC layer: Table gives the characteristics that the MAC layer is responsible for in the air interface [IEEE 820.20 WG, Desired characteristics for an MBWA air interface, Mar, 2003]. The air interface should support MAC protocols On, Hold and Sleep states with fast transitions among them. In the On state, client uses the system resources actively to transmit and receive data. In order to get higher system efficiency, the Hold state should be initiated whenever the client doesnt use the system. The sleep state is initiated when the user is completely inactive. Transitions between the states should be fast and dynamic. Total system efficiency is increased when the air-link resources that are consumed by users are few. This paves a way to add more users to that cell and decrease total system costs for both the user and the operator. Testing has shown that 100 concurrent active users are required to fully utilize the 1 to 2 Mb/s bandwidth available to a given sector or cell [IEEE 820.20 WG, user data models for an IP-based cellular network, Mar, 2003]. Paging mechanism is used to wake up the users from sleep state and bring them into On state. It allows a mobile station to conserve energy with the help of Sleep state and still allows for the mobile station to receive incoming packets. This is an important real-time application in which the station needs to be active at all times. In order to reduce the delay associated with waking a user up, the MBWA air interface should support the ability to send paging signals as often as once every 100 ms [1]. To have minimal packet loss and latency, the air interface should support both intersector and inter-cell handoff in a time that is comparable to the state transition time: 200 ms [IEEE 820.20 WG, Desired characteristics for an MBWA air interface, Mar, 2003].

Parameter Number of active users per sector/cell Transition from active on to active hold state Transition time from active hold state to active on state Transition time from active hold state to inactive sleep state Access time from inactive sleep state to active on state Paging signal periodicity Paging signal duration Minimum scheduling interval UL request time Intersector/cell handoff time

Proposed value > 100 < 100 ms < 50 ms < 100 ms < 200 ms < 100 ms < 1 ms < 2 ms < 10 ms < 200 ms

Table: Air Interface characteristics of PHY layer

802.16 AND 802.20 MESH NETWORKS: The 802.16a is a standard for the point-to-multipoint transmission and mesh topology networks. The traffic in Mesh Topology not only occurs between base station and subscriber station but also between the subscriber stations and traffic can be routed through subscriber stations. Depending on the transmission protocol algorithm used, this can be done on the basis of equality using distributed scheduling, or on the basis of superiority of the Mesh BS, which effectively results in centralized scheduling, or on a combination of both.[*]. The base station in a Mesh network in referred as Mesh BS. The Mesh BS is a station which manages all the backhaul services. All the other stations are Mesh SS (Mesh Subscriber Stations). Typically the systems in a mesh network are called Mesh nodes. The uplink and downlink in a mesh network refer to any traffic directed towards the Mesh BS and away from the Mesh BS respectively. Neighbor The stations with which a node communicates directly (a direct link to communicate exists). They are considered to be one hop away. Neighborhood Neighbors of a node form a neighborhood and all neighbors of a neighborhood form an extended neighborhood. One of the important differences between PMP and Mesh Networks is the functioning of a base station. In a PMP network the base station does not have to coordinate with any other node to transmit. Whereas, in a Mesh network all the nodes including the base station (Mesh BS) have to coordinate with other nodes to transmit. The nodes agree upon the rights to transmit and ensure that no collisions occur during the process of transmission. IEEE 802 working groups are working several wireless mesh standards. The IEEE 802.20 adopts a cellular architecture with macro cells, micro cells, and pico cells [1]. IEEE 802.20 addresses high-speed mobility

up to 250 km per hour [K. Sheikh and J. Humbert, Requirements Group Update, IEEE C802.20-03-109]. Wireless mesh network can be formed by Mobile stations in IEEE 802.20 and it can be connected to IEEE 802.16a, IEEE 802.11s, IEEE 802.15.5, 3GPP, and 3GPP2 to form heterogeneous wireless mesh networks. The technical aspects spectral efficiency, lower latencies, and improved user experience provides wide market potential than 3G systems. There are many challenges for building a large-scale and high-performance multi-hop wireless mesh network, such as compatibility, coexistence, scalability, security, QoS, and so forth [1]. The compatibility of new technologies with old technologies is the first challenge. The coexistence challenge needs IEEE 802.20 technology to fit well with AMPS, TDMA, GSM, IS-95, CDMA-2000, WCDMA, 1xEV-DV, 1xEV-DO, HSDPA, EDGE, GPS, IEEE 802.16, IEEE 802.16e, IEEE 802.16a, IEEE 802.15s, IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.11s, and so on[1]. The next challenge scalability states when the number of mobile stations and the network size increase, the performance of a wireless mesh network should not be degraded. Security is also difficult when compatibility, efficiency, and QoS issues are also considered at the same time [1]. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN 802.16 AND 802.20: 802.16e and 802.20 seem to be same but they differ in many ways. This can be discussed under End-user, Service provider and Technology categories. Under first category, both use symmetric data services but 802.16e has a high data rate fixed wireless user with an added mobile service whereas 802.20 gives high throughput data rate with full mobility. The transmission rates of 802.16e range from 10-50Mb/s and for 802.20 transmission rate is >16Mb/s. They support low-latency data services, in addition to this 802.16e also supports real time voice services. Under service provider class, 802.16e is provided by fixed wireless providers who are adding mobility as enhancement service on the other hand wireless data service provider deals with 802.20. In contrast to 802.16e, Mobile-fi provides global mobility and roaming support. Under technology category, MAC and PHY layers of 802.16e are extensions of 802.16a but 802.20 has new PHY and MAC layers which are optimized for packet data and adaptive antennas. 802.16e uses licensed band range of 2-6 GHz whereas 802.20 deals with licensed frequency below 3.5 GHz. Typical Channel bandwidths of 802.16e and 802.20 are >5 MHz and <5MHz respectively[3]. The cell radius of 802.16 is 50km whereas 802.20 has no specific cell radius. 802.16e support user speeds of 60km/h and 802.20 supports user speeds up to 250km/h. The technology in 802.20 is optimized for full mobility and for 802.16e it is also backward compatible with fixed mobile stations.

Standard Parameter 802.16e 802.20

Frequency Band Channel Bandwidth Transmission Rate Cell Radius Mobility Mobile Speed

2-6 GHz > 5 MHz 10 50 Mbps up to 50 Kms

3.5 GHz < 20 MHz > 16 Mbps ------

High-data-rate fixed wireless user with adFully mobile, high-throughput data user junct mobility service 60 kmph up to 250 kmph

Services

Support of low-latency data and real-time Support of low-latency data services voice services Local/regional mobility and roaming supGlobal mobility and roaming support port Extensions to 802.16a MAC and PHY New PHY and MAC optimized for packet data and adaptive antennas

Roaming

MAC / PHY

Technology

Technology is optimized for and backward Technology is optimized for full mobilcompatible with fixed stations ity

CONCLUSION: The main objective of IEEE 802.16 is to provide voice and data services for fixed and mobile users and that of IEEE 802.20 is to provide mobile broadband connections to mobile users. Although both standards aim at offering MBWA to the users, The IEEE 802.20 standard provides users with a high bandwidth, low latency and full mobility. 802.20 standard uses a new and improved MAC and PHY Layer architectures and starts from the scratch whereas 802.16e, aimed at providing Mobile Broadband wireless access, uses the modified versions of the existing 802.16 MAC and PHY layers. But, improving existing fixed wireless systems to support full vehicular mobility is not possible, since mobility support is a critical factor of the system that goes beyond just handoffs and fast multi-path fading. 802.16 rather targets at throughput than mobility. But, 802.20 was developed to cover the mobility part of 802.16 and has a higher throughput than 802.16e. 802.20 is not an add-on to the existing technology. It has been targeted entirely at mobile users and aimed at providing consistency across different channel sizes. 802.16e supports speeds up to vehicular speeds whereas, 802.20 supports speeds up to 250kmph. Hence, considering the different technological aspects and the system architecture of these standards the future of wireless broadband access with IEEE 802.20 Standard seems to prove to be a feasible and a viable business model. REFERENCES:

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WIRELESS ACCESS. Feb. 2007.

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Mobile Broadband Wireless Access for the Twenty-First Century. July 2008.

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Broadband Wireless Access Systems. 802.16 2001

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8. IEEE Standard for Local and metropolitan area networks Part 16: Air Interface for Fixed and Mobile
Broadband Wireless Access Systems Amendment 2: Physical and Medium Access Control Layers for Combined Fixed and Mobile Operation in Licensed Bands and Corrigendum 1.

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