GSM Fundamentals

ISSUE 3.2

Wireless
Wireless Curriculum
Curriculum Development
Development Section
Section
 Contents

Basic Concepts of Cellular Mobile System

Channels on The Air Interface
Service Area and Number Planning

GSM Network Components

Radio Technologies

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 Objectives

On completion of this section

you will be able to:

 Name the two different cell types

and understand why and when
each would be used.
 Get the concept of frequency
reuse.
 Name the frequency spectrum
used in GSM

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 CELL

Omni
Omni-Directional
Omni-Directional Cells
Cells
1

120
120 Degree
Degree Sectors
Sectors 1
120
degree 2
3
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 Cell concept
Signal
strength

Rural
Highway

Suburb Town
distance

• Cell
Flexible
: basic
network
service
planning
area that
based
can on
be efficiently
location nature
managed by the
network
• Smooth Handover (no service degradation while subscriber moves)
• One base station (equipment to switch, transmit and receive calls)
• Frequency reuse (same group of frequencies used in different cells)
per cell for comm. between MS and the network
• Cell boundaries are defined by BS signal strength
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 Frequency Spectrum
Physical GSM 900
channels
45 MHz duplex spacing

… S
200 KHz x 125 = 25 MHz ……
8T
… m
s
x
t
890 MHz
0.
5 77 915 MHz …935 MHz 960 MHz f
e=
fr am 200 KHz …
A
T DM
1

25 MHz … 25 MHz
f Uplink (MS to BS)
… Downlink (BS to MS)
890 MHz 915
MHz

200 KHz
For DCS1800: uplink from 1710 to 1785MHz, downlink is from 1805 to
1880MHz 75Mhz each / 374 RF carriers . 95MHz duplex spacing.
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 Contents

Basic Concepts of Cellular Mobile System

Channels on The Air Interface
Service Area and Number Planning
GSM Network Components
Radio Technologies

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 Objectives

On completion of this section

you will be able to:

Identify the types of physical channels

and logical channels

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 Logical
Logical channels
traffic channels

Logical Channels

SPEECH TCH CCH DATA

TCH/H TCH/F
R R 9.6kbps
2.4/4.8kbps(FR&HR)
7kbps 13kbps FR

logical channels consist of the information carried over the physical

channel.
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 Logical control channels

CCH

DCH CCCH BCH

SACC SDCC PC AGC RAC

H H H H H FCC
Power & timing control H
RSSI & link quality BCC SC
FACC H H
H •Power Control indicator
•cell ID , LAI , PLMN code
Auth. and HO. •List of neighboring cells

--Broadcast
Standalone
Slow/Fast
Random
Paging control
access
associated
channel channel,
- Frequency-correction
dedicated
:channel,
used forused
tochannel,
channel
control
page toused
channels
dedicatedsend
:(alert)
Supports
MS cell
:for MS
theinformation.
channels
carryingfrequency
transfer correction.
of data
assignment
information during connection
request
associated with the
- Synchronization
setup
-Access
process being
grantcarried channel,
channel, out
used used
on to
either for
assigntheMS frame or
dedicated
SDCCH synchronization
control channels and
the TCH. BS MS
for the
identification.
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 Timeslots and TDMA Frames

Low Capacity Cell / 1 RF carrier

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Combined Traffic

Higher Capacity Cell / more than 1 RF carrier

0 1 2 3 4 5 60 7
Broadcast Traffic
Dedicated

0 1 2 3 4 5 60 7
Traffic
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 Contents

Basic Concepts of Cellular Mobile System

Channels on The Air Interface
Service Area and Number Planning
GSM Network Components
Radio Technologies

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 Service Area

System area
PLMN
PLMN service
service area
area PLMN service area

MSC service area... MSC service area...

Location area... Location area...

......
Base station area... Base station area...

Radio cell
Radio cell

...... ......

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 LAI

MCC MNC LAC

Location Area Identification

The LAI is the international code for a location area.

MCC ： Mobile Country Code ， It consists of 3 digits .

For example: The MCC of China is "460"
MNC ： Mobile Network Code ， It consists of 2 digits .
For example: The MNC of China Mobile is "00"
LAC ： Location Area Code ， It is a two bytes BCD
code(hex).
The value 0000 and FFFF is invalid.
For example: 460-00-0011
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 CGI

CGI: Cell Global Identification

The CGI is a unique international identification for a cell

The format is LAI+CI
LAI: Location Area Identification
CI ： Cell Identity. This code uses two bytes BCD
code(hex) to identify the radio cells within an LAI.
For example : 460-00-0011-0001

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 MSISDN

CC NDC SN
National (significant)
Mobile number
Mobile station international
ISDN number

CC ： Country Code. For example: The CC of China is

"86".
NDC ： National Destination Code. For example: The NDC
of China Telecom is 139, 138, 137, 136, 135.
SN ： Subscriber Number. Format:H0 H1 H2 H3 ABCD
Example: 86-139-0666-1234
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 IMSI

Not more than 15 digits

3 digits 2 digits

MCC MNC MSIN

NMSI
IMSI

MCC ： Mobile Country Code ， It consists of 3 digits .

For example: The MCC of China is "460" 。
MNC ： Mobile Network Code ， It consists of 2 digits .
For example: The MNC of China Telecom is "00" 。
MSIN ： Mobile Subscriber Identification Number. H1H2H3 S
ABCDEF
For example: 666-9777001
NMSI ： National Mobile Subscriber Identification ， MNC and MSIN
form it together.
For Example of IMSI : 460-00-666-9777001
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 IMEI

IMEI: International Mobile Station Equipment Identification

TAC FAC SNR SP

IMEI

TAC ： Type approval code. It is administered by the type

approval center.
FAC ： Final assembly code.It is administered by the
manufacturer.
SNR ： Serial number.It is issued by the manufacturer of the
MS.
SP ： Not used.
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 Contents

Basic Concepts of Cellular Mobile System

Channels on The Air Interface
Service Area and Number Planning
GSM Network Components
Radio Technologies

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 GSM network architecture

Permanent
White list : data:
Temporary data:
--copy
IMSIofmobiles
Valid most of data for
active
-Suppl.subscribers
Black
service infoin. VLR
coveragelist :
OMC Othe
-Authentication key
-Mobileor
Stolen status
forbidden
r
-Roaming & billing info
-LAI GSM
Gray list :
Gray list :
-TMSI
Faulty mobiles
Temporary data:
-MSC/VLR address

PSTN

Base Transceiver Station : the first access point for mobile stations to access the
Base
Mobile
Station
Mobile Station
TheController
Switching
network. : -Center
BTS Mobile : :controls
is a radioEquipment
controlsone
onecontains
equipment or
or more
moreIMEI
BTSs
BSCsfor
(transceivers and
& ME
andinterfaces
identification
manages
antennas) BSS totoNSS.
switching
needed It is
serve
a high
each capacity
cell switch
- Subscriber
in the network. that provides
Identityhandover,
module contains
cell configuration
IMSI,TMSI,LAI,Auth.
data. key
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 Transcoder and submultiplexer

30 x 64k voice channels = 120 x 16k compressed/combined = 2Mbps PCM link

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 Contents

Basic Concepts of Cellular Mobile System

Channels on The Air Interface
Service Area and Number Planning
GSM Network Components
Radio Technologies

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 Objectives

On completion of this section you

will be able to know about the
following radio technologies :

Diversity

Frequency Hopping

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 Diversity

Approx. 10
wavelengths
When diversity is implemented
two antennas are situated at
the receiver. These antennas
are placed several
wavelengths apart to ensure
minimum correlation between
the two receive paths.
Compare or
The two signals are then add signals
combined, this ensures that a
low signal strength is less likely
to occur.
Resultant Signal

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 Frequency Hopping

Each time the BTS or mobile transmits a burst, it

does so on a different RF carrier frequency.

Synthesizer Hopping:each frequency

timeslot on a given
transceiver can transmit
at a different frequency
Baseband Hopping: each
transceiver stays at the
same frequency and the
data is switched to the
appropriate transceiver.

time
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