12 Results
A measurement campaign quantifying the impact of intermodulation in 5G TDD networks
Critical infrastructure: With the deployment of TDD networks, the mobile network community recognizes the critical importance of cell synchronization and the use of uniform TDD patterns across different networks for the proper operation of mobile radio networks. Variety of scenarios: Possible scenarios include cross-border situations, interactions between private campus networks and public mobile networks, and accidental synchronization chain breaks or misconfigurations within the mobile network.Measurement techniques: To quantify the effects of non-synchronized cells and using different TDD pattern in neighboring networks, R&S, in collaboration with TU Dresden and Advancing Individual Networks GmbH (AIN), conducted a measurement campaign using movable networks with full control over all network parameters. This campaign measured the effects on uplink and downlink throughput, mapping these to RSSI/RSRP values received at the interfered site.Customer benefits: The available quantification is valuable for predicting and assessing potential interference scenarios before setting up and operating a new cell site.
11-Sep-2024 | AN-No. 8NT18
Best practices for mobile network testing for business-critical applications
Business-critical infrastructure: Industrial applications require extremely high reliability and availability, as any downtime can result in significant financial losses. Fundamental requirements: Industrial applications often require low latency and even more important a sustainable latency to ensure real-time communication and control. Measurement Techniques: As soon as the radio access network is used, innovative testing methods are needed beforehand to proactively test the network capability and to identify any potential issues. We propose a standard test procedure for the characterization of a network regarding industrial use-cases that covers a representative set of different, common types of network traffic.
13-Aug-2024 | AN-No. 8NT17
5G NR Reduced Capabilities (RedCap) network scanning
Purpose of RedCap: RedCap is designed for use cases requiring reasonable data throughput, cost-efficient devices, reduced power consumption and smaller device footprint to support applications like wireless industrial sensors, video surveillance and smart wearables in which ultralow latency isn’t essential.Technology basics: Understanding the technology basics helps facing configuration complexities and avoiding potential coexistence issues with regular 5G.RedCap field verification: New mobile network technology introductions like 5G RedCap benefit from field measurements during their typical life-cycle phases (engineering, network roll-out, and operation).Measurement Techniques: In early phases of new technologies, passive network measurements using network scanners are reliable and effective in detecting actual network and cell configurations.
23-Apr-2024 | AN-No. 8NT13
Spectrum clearance in mobile networks is becoming ever more important as operators use new bands that previously contained other services. This is particularly important for the 5G NR rollout. 5G NR has already initiated a worldwide deployment of TDD networks in an unknown radio environment where unwanted transmitters can create uplink interference masked by downlink signals, making interference hunting particularly demanding. Automated detection of interference signals before a network switches on can be a big help in addition to traditional manual techniques.
19-Apr-2024
Best practices for national regulatory authorities
Key points:Importance of field measurements: Traditional network planning tools and models only offer an estimated view of mobile coverage. Field measurements are conducted under real geographical and load conditions, and therefore provide a more accurate picture and can discover interferences more effectively. Coverage investigations: When deploying a mobile network, operators must adhere to regulatory standards and licensing conditions. As a result, regulatory authorities carry out field measurements on a regular or ad hoc basis to validate compliance or investigate customer complaints. This process identifies coverage gaps and areas of poor network quality, enabling regulatory authorities to take actions to enhance service quality for consumers and guide network expansion.Foster competition: If the field measurements of the coverage and performance are performed on a scale representative of a given country, the transparency of these results can promote healthy competition between operators and better service for consumers, which is essential for economic growth and social development.Measurement Techniques: The harmonized methodology for measuring and evaluating data throughput and QoE based on popular services is described in ETSI TR 103 559.
15-Apr-2024 | AN-No. 8NT14
P25 and FRMCS scanning
Key points: Critical Infrastructure: Learn about mission-critical communication for various agencies who deal with Public Safety such as first responders, police, firefighters, medics and its crucial role in ensuring safety of society.Reliability of Communication: Understand the challenges posed by mission-critical communication, highlighting performance and reliability needs and special requirements such as safe group communications.Technology Migration: Delve into the migration of mission-critical communication from long-standing narrow-band technologies to broadband use cases considering migration timelines.Measurement Techniques: Explore network measurement methods for passive testing of legacy MCX technologies planned to be used in the networks for quite some time (a later release of the document will focus on the broadband successors)
12-Mar-2024 | AN-No. 8NT12
Spectrum scans are beneficial for many use-cases such as troubleshooting, interference detection and interference hunting, or verification tasks like scheduler verification or other engineering tasks. A time-gated spectrum scan, which is a power spectrum scan which applies a time gate on uplink/downlink slots/symbols and/or the guard period reveals even more details in uplink/downlink or guard period power spectrum. This allows to focus on the uplink / downlink or guard period power spectrum in 5G NR TDD networks. This educational note explains use cases for spectrum measurements, the complexity in 5G TDD and its technology basics, and which problems can be solved with the described solution. The software used is R&S®ROMES4 together with a R&S®TSMx6 drive and walk test scanner.
21-Sep-2023 | AN-No. 8NT08
Modern societies worldwide depend on the performance, reliability and security of critical infrastructures and networks. There is a plethora of “new verticals” such as manufacturing, warehouse, mining, ports or other critical infrastructure, just to name a few. These “new vertical” use cases all have one common requirement: the mobile network needs to provide a superior performance compared to a commercial mobile network. In such environments 5G brings new capabilities to build fast and secure campus or private networks tuned to higher performance, which can increase productivity and efficiency. To be successful in these business-critical use cases, the wireless networks need to be as reliable as the wired ones. This educational note describes the different test methods to be able to verify the superior network performance and to help finding root causes of potential problems limiting the performance. We distinguish between passive tests and active tests.
11-Aug-2023 | AN-No. 8NT09
For several years, vehicle manufacturers and government agencies have sought ways to increase road safety, manage traffic efficiently and, in the future, make driving more comfortable, convenient and safe. Vehicle-to-everything (V2X) is a new generation of information and communication technology that connects vehicles to everything and can support these objectives. V2X is designed to offer low-latency vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V), vehicle-to-roadside infrastructure (V2I) and vehicle-to-pedestrian (V2P) communications to add a new dimension to future driver assistance systems.Cellular V2X (C-V2X) is defined as the communications standard by 3GPP in Release 14 and uses LTE technology as the physical interface for communications.The LTE C-V2X Scanner provides customers an opportunity to verify, test, and optimize ITS traffic systems that are being deployed or are already established. The scanner accomplishes this by passively listening to PC (5.9GHz) messages that are being broadcast from RSU (roadside units), vehicles or any other C-V2X enabled device. Traditional scanner measurements regarding RF signal power and quality such as RSRP, RS-CINR and RSSI, are provided for each physical channel (PSCCH and PSSCH) as well as decoded ITS message content for all three regions (North America, EU, China).
21-Oct-2022 | AN-No. 8NT07
Create and simulate detailed traffic situations for the verification of cellular V2X (C-V2X) connectivity
30-Jun-2022
For NB-IoT applications to function correctly, sufficient network coverage is required. Coverage must be measured to ensure a robust NB-IoT connection. Rohde & Schwarz mobile network testing provides a unique combined test solution that accurately measures the DL coverage using network scanners. It measures the device/network interaction, UL behavior, protocol, signaling load and energy efficiency during communications using NB-IoT devices connected to R&S®ROMES.
20-Feb-2018
Rohde & Schwarz mobile network testing solutions enable operators to efficiently increase network capacity via hardware-related, capacity-enhancing features such as antenna tilt optimization, carrier aggregation, 4x4 MIMO and 6-sector sites.
09-Aug-2016