21

Fundamentals of LTE :

RF scanning and best candidate selection:

As we switch on the UE it scans all the bands it supports. With a frequency GAP of 200khz
1980 Jan 22 01:20:26.146 [06] 0xB18E LTE ML1 System Scan Results
Version = 2
Num Candidates = 9
Candidates
----------------------------------------
| | | | |Energy |
|# |EARFCN|Band|Bandwidth|(dBm/100KHz)|
----------------------------------------
| 0| 1450| 3| 20 MHz| -91|
| 1| 1374| 3| 5 MHz| -93|
| 2| 1424| 3| 5 MHz| -93|
| 3| 1324| 3| 5 MHz| -102|
| 4| 1750| 3| 20 MHz| -118|
| 5| 2950| 7| 20 MHz| -118|
| 6| 1236| 3| 5 MHz| -118|
| 7| 3100| 7| 20 MHz| -118|
| 8| 2850| 7| 20 MHz| -118|

process UE first time read more about

switch on.docx sync process

Synchronisation process and channels involved:

PSS(Click here)
-------------------------------
| |PSS | | |
| |Peak | | |
| |Value |Peak |PSS |
|# |(dB) |Position|Indicies|
-------------------------------
| 0| 8.566| 5358| 2|
| 1| 4.087| 5357| 2|
| 2| -6.021| 5427| 2|
| 3| -7.270| 5426| 2|
| 4| -7.270| 5417| 2|
| 5| -7.270| 5416| 2|
| 6| -9.031| 5299| 2|
| 7| -9.031| 7786| 0|
| 8| -9.031| 5339| 0|
SSS (Click Here)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| |SSS | | | | | | | |Min |Max |
| |Peak |Cell| |Half Frame| |Rx0 LNA |Rx1 LNA | |Frame |Frame |
|# |Value|ID |CP |Hypothesis|EARFCN|Offset |Offset |Frame Boundary |Boundary|Boundary|
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0|13944| 260| Normal| Mid| 1450| 0.000| 0.000| 7168224| 0| 0|
| 1| 652| 245| Normal| Pre| 1450| 0.000| 0.000| 7320704| 0| 0|

Purpose of Synch signals

1) For Cell-ID calculation
2) Time Synch (with slot, subframe and frame)
3) CP determination
4) To find out the duplex mode (FDD or TDD)

Pankaj Sharma
21

Reference signal Decoding :-

After the successful decoding of PSS and SSS , UE tries to decode the reference signals from
the cell ID it got from PSS and SSS.

These are used by UE for channel estimation. These pilot symbols provide an estimate of the
channel conditions at given locations within a subframe. Reference signals are embedded into
specific RE's such that channel conditions can be known at different frequency and time
domain within a subframe. Reference signals are always QPSK modulated.

There are 5 kinds of reference signals as mentioned in specifications as:-

1. Cell specific reference signals:- These are common for all the UE's within a cell. The RE's
on which reference signals will be present is given by a formula mentioned in spec 36211 sec
6.10.1.2

Cell specific reference signals supports Antenna ports 1,2 ,3 and 4. Please refer to Fig 8.3
from Theory and practice book of LTE

2. UE specific reference signals: - These are usually multiplexed with the downlink data for
that corresponding UE. It supports Antenna port 5,7 and 8.

3.Positioning Reference Signals:- It supports Antenna port 6.

4. MBSFN reference signals
5. CSI reference signals

System Information:
MIB : NEW information is transmitted every 40ms and gets repeated every 10 ms.
Version = 2
Physical cell ID = 260
FREQ = 1450
SFN = 960
Number of TX Antennas = 2
DL Bandwidth = 20 MHz (100)

-----------------------------------
| |Transmit| | | |
| |Antenna |SFN | |Energy |
|# |Config |Offset|CRC |Metric |
-----------------------------------
| 0| 1| 0|Fail| 1550|
| 1| 1| 1|Fail| 1486|
-----------------------------------

MIB in detail PBCH processing MIB read me

0xB176 LTE Initial Acquisition Results

Version = 3
E-ARFCN = 1450
Band = 3
Pankaj Sharma
21

Duplex Mode = FDD

Result = Success
Min Search Half Frames = 1
Min Search Half Frames Early Abort = 1
Max Search Half Frames = 4
Max PBCH Frames = 20
Number of Blocked Cells = 0
Number PBCH Decode Attemp Cells = 1
Number of Search Results = 2
Search Results
----------------------------------------------------------------------
| | | | | |Frequency|PSS | |
| |Frame |Sample|Physical| |Offset |Correlation|SSS Power|
|# |Offset |Offset|Cell ID |CP |(Hz) |Result |Value |
----------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0|Unknown|102624| 260| Normal| 19| 0| 0.000831|
| 1|Unknown|255104| 245| Normal| 19| 0| 0.000039|

PBCH Decode Attempt Cells

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
| | | | |Updated | |Number | | |
| | | | |Frequency| |of | |Number |
| |Frame |Sample|MIB |Offset |Physical|Decode |Decode |of Tx |
|# |Offset |Offset|Payload |(Hz) |Cell ID |Attempts|Result |Antennas|
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0|Unknown|102624|0xA7C00000| 0| 260| 1|Success| 2|

SIBs decoding in LTE system :

SIBs in detail

PLMN selection and parameters involved:

PLMN PLMN - more info

Watch video:

Cell reselection and parameters involved:

W to L_reselection L_Cell_selection Idle_mode_procedure

_36304-d60.doc

Rach Process and parameters involved:

Once we read the system information the UE initiate an attach process with the found PLMN and it goes through the RACH
process using the common parameters it has read from SIB2… open the below document for details.

Rach Process White-Paper-PRACH.

pdf

Read Me…😊

DL link adaption process

1-UE report CQI/PMI/RI in PUCCH or PUSCH(aperiodic CSI reporting )

Pankaj Sharma
21

2-eNB allocate DL resources (No of PRBs, MCS and TBS) on PDCCH

3- eNB send data on PDSCH

4-UE attempt to decode Data and send HARQ ACK NACK on PUCCH or PUSCH

DLA.pptx

UL link adaptation

1-UE send SR in PUCCH if UE doesn't have PUSCH. UE must complete RACH procedure for requesting UL Resource.

2-eNB allocate UL PRB and UL MCS to UE through UL grant on PDCCH.

3-UE send user data on PUSCH.

4- If eNB decode uplink data successfully then eNB send ACK on PHICH

 Once initial uplink grant allocated then

1-UE send PUSCH +BSR and PHR to network

2- eNB adjust resources and allocated to UE through UL grant on PDCCH

3- UE send user data on PUSCH

4 - if eNB decode uplink data it toggle NDI and send ACK on PHICH

ULA.pptx

Data processing

eNB PDCP layer receive IP packet then PDCP layer will start PDCP discard timer and do IP header removal If the
compression is activated, activate Integrity and Ciphering, add PDCP header (sequence no) and deliver PDCP PDU to RLC
layer.

Pankaj Sharma
21

RLC layer upon receive PDCP PDU do RLC functionalities like RLC segmentation, concatenation, padding, error
correction, in sequence delivery of packet, add RLC header based on RLC mode and make RLC PDU and deliver to MAC
layer.

So every tti RLC layer inform MAC layer about the size of BO (Buffer Occupancy). Then based BO, Channel condition, user
priority MAC layer will select MCS, TBS, Modulation, Coding and No of RB and deliver to Physical layer over Transport
Block.

If eNB RLC layer receive Status PDU with ACK from UE RLC layer then eNB RLC layer will clear PDCP SDU from RLC layer.
This whole process has to done within this PDCP discard timer.

Lets say PDCP delivery PDCP PDU to RLC layer(for RLC layer this is PDCP SDU) and ACK not received from UE RLC layer
before PDCP discard timer expiry then eNB PDCP layer send Message to eNB RLC layer to discard the packet.For RLC AM
mode we have two type error correction mechanism one HARQ Retransmission which is PHY layer and controlled by MAC
layer and another is ARQ which is RLC layer.

Whenever RLC layer received PDCP SDU ,it will keep a copy of it in its RLC Retransmission buffer until it receive control
status PDU with ACK from UE RLC layer.

Click her for more details 😊

So when MAC layer receive RLC SDU it will keep one copy of it in its buffer and make MAC PDU and deliver to PHY layer. If
UE MAC-PHY layer decode downlink packet successful then it will send HARQ ACK and deliver the packet to upper layer
RLC. Once receiving RLC layer receive packet then it will send control status PDU with ACK and once eNB RLC received
status PDU it will delete the SDU from its Retransmission buffer.

If UE MAC-PHY layer not able to decode downlink packet due to many reason (Bad air, DTX and all) then UE MAC-PHY
layer send HARQ NACK then eNB MAC layer Retransmit the same data with different RV version and wait for HARQ ACK,
Mac layer will do this up to "max a certain no of times" which is configured by eNB RRC in RRC Reconfiguration under
Mac Config IE.

So once Mac max Retransmit complete and no HARQ ACK receive then eNB MAC layer will inform RLC layer then RLC ARQ
Retransmission start. eNB RLC layer Retransmit the same copy data from Retransmission buffer and deliver to MAC layer
again MAC layer again follow the same procedure upto max Mac Retransmit till it get HARQ ACK.

Here we have to to understand two important parameters for error correction which are configured by ENB RRC layer.

1-Max RLC Retransmission threshold - let's say 4 (which is RLC maximum Retransmission number until it receives Status
PDU from UE RLC)

2- MAC Max no of transmission (max HARQ Tx) let say 5

Here we need to understand two important parameters for error correction, which are configured by ENB RRC
layer.

1-Max RLC Retransmission threshold - let's say 4 (which is RLC maximum Retransmission number until it receives
Status PDU from UE RLC)
rlc-Config explicitValue : am :
{
ul-AM-RLC
{
t-PollRetransmit ms50,
pollPDU pInfinity,
pollByte kB25,
maxRetxThreshold t4
},
dl-AM-RLC
{
t-Reordering ms35,
t-StatusProhibit ms0
}
},

2- MAC Max no of transmission (max HARQ Tx) let say 5

mac-MainConfig explicitValue :
{
ul-SCH-Config
Pankaj Sharma
21

{
maxHARQ-Tx n5,
periodicBSR-Timer sf5,
retxBSR-Timer sf320,
ttiBundling FALSE
},
drx-Config release : NULL,
timeAlignmentTimerDedicated infinity,
phr-Config setup :
{
periodicPHR-Timer sf500,
prohibitPHR-Timer sf200,
dl-PathlossChange dB3
}
},

So when eNB MAC layer receive first downlink data from RLC layer it will transmit first new transmission followed by 4
Retransmission. If all transmission (one initial transmission + 4 Retransmission) fails then it will inform RLC layer then RLC
will Retransmit original copy of data from Retransmission buffer to MAC layer and decrement max-retransmission threshold
to 3 and this will continue up to once RLC max Retransmission threshold =0

So from above example after 20 transmission (4 RLC transmission and 5 Mac transmission per each RLC transmission) fail
UE met RLF.

Out of 20 transmission (4 are new transmission means original data and 16 are Retransmission Data with additional bit
added to recover the original data)

One thing I explained incorrect the two parameters max Retransmission threshold and Mac max HARQ tx which are
signalled to UE through RRC Connection SetUp or RRC Reconfiguration are for UL UE RLC and MAC.

Same parameters are already configure in eNB RLC and MAC

Another is MAC won't tell RLC about HARQ Retransmission failure.RLC will do arq Retransmission when it receives status
PDU with NACK .Whenever transmit RLC want status PDU from receiving RLC it will set polling bit to 1 in RLC PDU .And
polling will trigger when either of below conditions trigger

-Poll PDU //if this many PDU transmitted then transmit RLC want status PDU from receiving RLC by setting
polling bit set to 1

-Poll Bytes //if this many bytes transmitted

-Poll max Retransmit timer expiry

{
ul-AM-RLC
{
t-PollRetransmit ms50,
pollPDU pInfinity,
pollByte kB25,
maxRetxThreshold t4
},
dl-AM-RLC
{
t-Reordering ms35,
t-StatusProhibit ms0
}
},

Uplink Signals and Channels

1- DMRS(Demodulation Reference Signal)

Purpose of the DMRS signal is help the enoedb To demodulate PUCCH and PUSCH signals

Transmissions of these signals :

Pankaj Sharma
21

Frequency domain: It transmitted on same RB which carry PUCCH and PUSCH.

And in Time domain DMRS are transmitted on Fourth symbol of every slot for PUSCH transmission.

For PUCCH the no of symbol differ with different PUCCH format.

2- SRS( Sounding Reference Signal)

Purpose of the SRS is to provide a measure of the UL Channel quality estimation so that the UE specific
scheduling can be assisted scheduling and power control. SRS are useful in ULFSS that us uplink frequency
selective scheduling.

Aperiodic_CQI.pptx LTE Frequency

selective scheduling SRS Draft1.0.docx

Transmission:

-Transmitted in last symbol of a subframe in time domain.

Frequency domain

It is not mapped to PUCCH and PUSCH

RB.

Often transmitted in larger frequency span.

SRS periodicity and bandwidth is cell specific and signalled to UE through RRC message.

3- PRACH

Purpose :Used by non synchronised UE to access the network for

- Initial access

-Uplink synchronisation

-Handover

-Connection reestablishment after radio link failure

Transmission

Time domain

UE transmit PRACH on subframe which is determine by Preamble Config Index signaled to UE in SIB2

Frequency domain :

UE need 6 RB starting from PRACH frequency offset signalled to UE in SIB2.

PUCCH deep dive

4-PUCCH

Purpose :

-Carries UCI (Uplink control information) includes CQI, PMI, RI, HARQ Ack/Nack , SR
Pankaj Sharma
21

Transmission:

-Common channel for all UE's

-Never transmitted simultaneously with PUSCH of same UE.

- Always transmitted at the edges.

5- PUSCH

Purpose:

Carry data and control information UCI.

Transmission :

Mapped to those RE which is not map to Reference Signal.

4- PCFICH

Purpose - carries no of ofdm symbol used to decode PDCCH in a subframe.

Carries CFI (Control Format Indicator)

If No.of RB is less than 10 then

CFI=1 means only first 2 symbol of every subframes used to decode PDCCH

CFI=2 means first 3 symbols of every subframe used to decode PDCCH

If No. Of RB greater than 10

Then CFI=1 means first one symbol of every subframe used to decode PDCCH

CFI=2 means first two symbols of eveey subframe used to decode PDCCH

CFI=3 means first three symbols of every suffrage used to decode PDCCH

Transmission

Time domain - Transmitted on 1st symbol of every subframe.

Frequency domain- Always mapped to 16 RE.

5- PDCCH

Purpose - Carry DCI, Resource assignment for UL and DL, modulations and coding

Transmission

Time

- Up to maximum three symbols per subframe depend upon CFI in PCFICH

Frequency

- Transmitted in aggregation level 1,2, 4 or 8 of CCE of different PDCCH formats.

1CCE=36 RE's (9 REG's)

-Each PDCCH is scrambled with RNTI

Pankaj Sharma
21

It could be UE specific RNTI or common RNTI(SI-RNTI,PI-RNTI and RA-RNTI)

PDCCH in detail PDCCH agg level

Click me for More Info….

PDSCH (Physical Downlink shared channel)

RAT types.docx

6- PHICH

Purpose carry DL HARQ Ack/Nack for Up link data

PHICH is mapped to PHICH group and each PHICH group have

- 3 REG =3×4=12 RE

-Eight PHICH (Normal CP) and 4 PHICH (Extended CP) are mapped to a PHICH group.

Transmission

Normal duration - 1st symbol of every subframe

Extended duration - two or three symbols of every subframe

PHICH in detail

Low Downlink TP
- dl bler(Initial and Residual bler)

- dl sinr vs cqi, ri, mcs, rb, rsrp

- check whether UE is being scheduled every tti, if not check whether measurement gap or drx on

-check harq ack nack

-check whether is there any fluctuation in RB

-check sim mbr

- pdcp in/out traffic

- Backhaul issue

Downlink Throughput
Troubleshooting.docx

UL throughput issue
Pankaj Sharma
21

- UL bler

- ul path loss

- UL grant

-bsr

-phr

-UE tx Power

-srs

- harq ack nack

UL_Throughput_tro.d
ocx

Handovers Mobility (events )

LTE connected mode mobility A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6 and B1 and B2 check RRC Reconfiguration .

OUT OF synch & RLF declaration

There are following conditions in which RLF happens:

 If

Pankaj Sharma
21

N310-10 (Out of sync) triggered when UE hit PDCCH bler >10% due to bad RF

N311-1 triggered when UE comes from Out of sync to In sync when PDCCH bler reduces to 1%

T310-1000 ms RLF (After UE hit N310 and after N310 expire T310 timer start and after expiry of T310 UE hit RLF)

T311- 3000 ms after UE hit RLF T311 timer start and within this timer UE find a suitable cell for RRC Recovery

T301- once UE find a suitable cell UE trigger RRE procedure by sending RRC Reestablishment and start timer T301 and
expect RRC Reestablishment Request message within T301 timer

For detailed explanation:

out of sync.docx

UPLINK SYNC LOSS

PDCCH Order in LTE

PDCCH Order is a procedure to bring back uplink out-of-sync UE (user equipment) back to in-sync state in case
there is downlink data available for it. This can happen in situation when the time alignment Timer  gets expired
because there is no uplink and downlink data transmission for some time and also when there is no Time
alignment command received from eNB. Time Alignment timer controls how long the UE is considered uplink
time aligned.

For viewers to better understand PDCCH Order here is an example:

Pankaj Sharma
21

1. Lets assume we have a UE that is in RRC connected state

2. There is uplink / downlink user data being transmitted for some time (like facebook activity etc)
3. There is no more data to be transmitted. Time Alignment timer will start (expiry setting = 10 seconds).
But remember the RRC Inactivity Timer will also start since there is no data activity but lets assume that our
Inactivity Timer doesnt expire and we remain in RRC connected state for whole duration
4. Time Alignment timer expires and UE is considered uplink out-of-sync now. At this point UE releases all
PUCCH (scheduling resources, CQI configuration) and SRS resources. UE also flushes its HARQ buffers
5. UE is still in RRC Connected state but it has no PUCCH/SRS resources as they were released
previously. Now there is DL data in eNB buffer for UE (Like facebook notification or something) but first UE has
to be brought back to in-sync state and also it needs to reconfigured again with PUCCH/SRS resources
6. eNB sends PDCCH order to UE using DCI 1A format. This is basically signal to UE to perform the
contention less RACH with preamble index already included in DCI 1A 
7. UE sends MSG1 using RACH preamble acquired from PDCCH order (To read more about RACH
procedure in LTE, click here)
8. eNB sends RACH response with new time advance value so that UE can be uplink in-sync
9. UE is in sync again ! 
10. Next eNB sends RrcConnectionReconfiguration message which carries PUCCH/SRS as they were
released when the time alignment timer was expired at step 4
11. UE confirms reception of RrcConnectionReconfiguration message and now can resume uplink/downlink
transmission of data

Why UE needs time alignment ? 

Due to different signal transmission paths and movement, UE can lose time synchronization to eNB subframe.
eNB measures the time alignment of UE by measuring the difference between arrival time of PUCCH, PUSCH,
SRS  to its own uplink subframe

Pankaj Sharma
21

For CSFB check ATTACH Request and UE capability Information for CSFB support check by UE and RRC Connection
Release message (Redirection Carrier Info)

For UE based ANR check RRC Reconfiguration and check Report CGI field

For Handover check RRC Reconfiguration and check target mobility cell info , dedicate RACH parameters and T304
handover time.

For CA , CA Capability Check please check UE capability Information and check

- UE category it should be Cat 6

- EUTRA Band Support( UE should support Jio Band B3, B5, B40)

- CA Bandwidth Class ( Currently Jio support Class A, Maximum ATBC =100 Mhz and max 5CC support

- Band Combination

- Bandwidth Combination set ( as LTE has flexible bandwidth support)

- FGI bit 111, 112(SCell Addition during Handover)

SCell Addition/Release please check RRC Reconfiguration

SCell Activation and Deactivation please check MAC CE command receive by UE through UE logs (MAC DL Transport
Block)

RRE step by step sequence

1- Once UE hit with Out of Sequence mean bler is greater than a threshold which is 10 % for a configurable time which is
N310 signalled to UE in SIB2

2- If UE doesn't come in In Sync before N310 expire

3- after N310 expire T310 timer start (which is RRE timer) after expiry of T310 timer

4 - T311 timer start and before expiry of T311 timer UE select a suitable cell it could be the same serving cell or target
cell... Once UE find a suitable cell before T311

5- after T311 timer expiry, UE will send RRC Reestablishment Request Message to new cell and start timer T301 and
before expiry of T301 UE should receive RRC Reestablishment message from New cell and send RRC Reestablishment
complete message to new cell.. This completes RRE procedure but in UE log you will see 4 other message

Now Call Flow

1- MIB of new cell

2- SIB 1

3- SIB2 and get UL RACH and PRACH Parameters

4- Message 1 Preamble Transmission

5- Message 2 Random Access Response and got UL Grant for message 6

Pankaj Sharma
21

6- RRC Reestablishment Request message from UE to Network. UE will send C-RNTI, short MAC-I and PCI Information
where RLF happen (this will be your UE serving cell) and PCI where UE send RRC Re-establish (which is new cell)

Once eNB decode RRC Reestablishment Request message from UE it will send HARQ ACK on PHICH and then send
Contention Resolution Message to UE

7- New Cell send RRC Reestablishment message to UE and activate SRB 1 and also reactivate Ciphering and Integrity with
out changing the algorithm

8- UE send RRC Reestablishment Complete message

9- New Cell send RRC Reconfiguration and configure SRB 2 and DRB (QCI 9)

10- UE send RRC Reconfiguration Complete

11- New Cell send UE Information Request message to UE and ask for last RLF report

12- UE respond with UE Information Response and provides last RLF serving and Target cell RSRP details

13- Over X2 interface new cell send X2 RLF Indication report to Old Cell

PDCP LAYER
Header Compression
PDCP performs header compression and decompression to reduce overhead due to large headers. Header
compression also reduces transmission delay and packet loss rate. An example for Voice over IP with
IP/UDP/RTP headers is shown in the figure. The header compression is based on Robust Header
Compression (ROHC) framework. There is one instance of ROCH for each PDCP entity. That means there is
one ROHC instance for each Radio Bearer (RB). The ROHC compressor entity is implemented at the
transmitter; the and decompressor entity is implemented at the receiver. LTE defines IP flows; each IP flow
refers to application stream. For example, there are three streams for video applications: audio, video and
control. Multiple IP flows can be sent over the same ROHC instance. Each IP flow can be associated with a
ROHCcontext, identified by a Connection ID (CID). A ROHC profile can be associated with each context. A
ROCH profile indicates which headers are compressed. The ROHC profiles and parameters are signalled and
configured by higher layers.

Pankaj Sharma
21

Robust Header Compression (ROHC) Profiles

The ROHCprofile supports compression of a specific set of protocols. ROHC defines several profiles. The
supported profile set for PDCP is shown in the table. There can be multiple IP flows per Radio Bearer. The
ROHC profile is associated with an IP flow. The ROHC channel is a unidirectional channel: there is one
channel for the Downlink, and one for the Uplink. Therefore, there is one set of parameters for each
channel. However, the same values shall be used for both channels belonging to the same PDCP.

Integrity Protection

Pankaj Sharma
21

Integrity protection is provided for RRC signalling NAS signalling and is applied at the PDCP layer between
the UE and the eNB. The EIA refers to EPS Integrity Algorithm. LTE provides the ability to select from several
integrity algorithms, such as SNOW 3G and Advanced Encryption Algorithm (AES).

The message, which is to be integrity protected includes, message itself and some other variable
parameters.

Below are the parameters, which are used for integrity protection:

 KEY: 128-bit integrity key (KRRCint)

 BEARER: 4-bit bearer identity, value is RBIdentity-1
 DIRECTION: 1-bit direction of transmission
 COUNT: time and direction dependent 32-bit input, which corresponds to the 32-bit PDCP COUNT. The
COUNT is a combination of PDCP Sequence Number (SN) and Hyper Frame Number (HFN).

At transmission, the EIA generates the value of MAC-I, which is essentially a keyed checksum over the
message. Upon reception, the EIA verifies the integrity of the received PDCP signalling PDU by calculating
the X-MAC based on the input parameters specified above. If the calculated X-MAC corresponds to the
received MAC-I, integrity protection is verified successfully.

Ciphering

The data is ciphered by the PDCP protocol between the UE and the eNB. Both Control Plane and User Plane
can be ciphered. For the Control Plane, only RRC signalling is ciphered by PDCP. The NAS signalling is
ciphered separately at the NAS layers. LTE provides the ability to select from several ciphering algorithms,
such as SNOW 3G and Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) algorithm. The input parameters to the 128-bit
EEA algorithms for ciphering and deciphering are configured by RRC layer, and are shown in the figure:
 KEY: 128-bit cipher key (KUPenc for User Plane and KRRCenc for signaling)
 BEARER:4-bit bearer identity, value is RBIdentity-1
 DIRECTION: 1-bit direction of transmission
 LENGTH: the length of the key stream required

Pankaj Sharma
21

 COUNT: bearer specific time and direction dependent 32-bit input, which corresponds to the 32-bit
PDCP COUNT. The COUNT is combination of PDCP Sequence Number (SN) and Hyper Frame Number
(HFN).

In-order Delivery

PDCP re-establishment is performed afterRRCconnection re-establishment after radio link failure (RLF) or
handover.Actions for RLC Acknowledged Mode bearers for User Plane Data
 Reset ROHC parameters
– Sequence Number (SN) and HFN values are continued
– Tx side: Resend all PDCP SDUs not yet acknowledged by RLC in UL and DL
– Rx side: Send PDCP Status Report
Actions for RLC Unacknowledged Mode bearers
– Reset ROHC parameters
– Reset SN and HFN values
– Send all the SDUsthat have assigned Sequence Numbers, but not yet submitted to RLC layer Actions
for Signaling Bearers
– Discard all messages and reset SN and HFN

Pankaj Sharma
21

Reordering during Handover

It is PDCP’sresponsibility to perform reordering when RLC is reset during handover or RRC connection
reestablishment. If packets are received out of order within the reordering window, the PDCP performs
reordering before delivering packets to upper layers. The reordering window size is 2048.
In this example, PDU # 4094 is received later. Therefore, the PDCP layer stores PDUs numbered 4095, 0, 1,
and 2. They are delivered in order when PDU #4094 is received.
If PDU #4094 does not arrive within the reordering window, the PDCP layer sends remaining PDUs (4095, 0,
1, and 2) in order to upper layer.

Pankaj Sharma
21

What is a LTE Scheduler ?

Scheduling is a process through which eNodeB decides which UEs should be given resources (RBs), how much
resource (RBs) should be given to send or receive data .In LTE, scheduling is done at per subframe basis i.e.
every 1 mili second. The entity which is govern this is know as scheduler.

Pankaj Sharma
21

A scheduler takes input from OAM as system configuration e.g. which scheduling algorithm is to be enable
(round robin, Max C/I, Proportional Fair, QoS aware etc), consider QoS information (Which QCI, GBR/N-GBR
etc.) and channel quality information (CQI, Rank, SINR etc) to make the decisions.

A LTE scheduler performs following function for efficient scheduling:

 Link Adaptation: It selects the optimal combination of parameters such as modulation, channel Coding
& transmit schemes i.e. Transmission Mode (TM1/TM2/TM3/TM4) as a function of the RF conditions.
 Rate Control: It is in charge of resource allocation among radio bearers of the same UE which are
available at the eNB for DL and at the UE for UL.
 Packet Scheduler: It arbitrates access to air interface resources on 1ms-TTI basis amongst all active
Users (Users in RRC Connected State).
 Resource Assignment: It allocates air interface resources to selected active users on per TTI basis.
 Power Control: Provides the desired SINR level for achieving the desired data rate, but also controls
the interference to the neighbouring cells.
 HARQ (ARQ + FEC): It allows recovering from residual errors by link adaptation.

LTE Services and Scheduling Mechanism:

The Services/ Applications are broadly classified into two categories as Real time services and Non-Real time
services. Real time services includes Conversational Voice, Video Phony [Conversational Video], MPEG Video
[Non Conversational Video], Real-time gaming etc. Non-Real time services include Voice Messaging, Buffered
Streaming, ftp, www, email, Interactive gaming etc.The data transmission characteristics of these services are:

 Delay tolerance
 Data Packet Size [Fixed or Variable]
 Periodic or Aperiodic data transmission
 Packet error loss rate, etc.

Some or all of these characteristics determine what kind of Packet schedulers are required at the LTE MAC to
adhere to the required QoS requirements of the relevant applications. LTE MAC supports the following three
types of Scheduling:

 Dynamic Scheduling
 Persistent Scheduling
 Semi-Persistent Scheduling

1. Dynamic Scheduling: Every TTI, MAC checks for the UEs to be scheduled, the Data Availability for
each UE to be scheduled and the feedback from the UE on the Channel conditions. Based on these
data, it can schedule the resources for the UE through the PDCCH. If data is not available, UE will not
get scheduled. All Services can be scheduled using Dynamic Scheduling, but at the expense of the
Control signalling [PDCCH Usage – a scarce resource].
2. Persistent Scheduling: In this case, Packets are scheduled on a fixed basis, similar to the Circuit
Switched fashion. Here, it does not depend on the Channel Condition. The Resource allocation remains
constant for the period of the call.
3. Semi-Persistent Scheduling: It is a Hybrid way of scheduling, which tries to overcome the drawbacks
of the Dynamic Scheduling and the Persistent Scheduling.

Semi-Persistent Scheduling

Pankaj Sharma
21

The figure above show conversational voice is considered for persistent scheduling. It is clear that, because of
the fixed resource allocation, UE will end up in underutilizing the allocated resources, because of non-availability
of the sufficient data during the persistently scheduled TTIs. Here, because the Speaker sometimes speaks and
sometimes user may give pauses during the conversation, Voice activity period and Voice Inactivity period exist
in the Speech data. If the Speech Codec without VAD is involved, then it sends the Voice Payload at the end of
every voice frame length of 20ms during the Voice activity period and sends nothing during the Voice Inactivity
period. So, the fixed resource allocations will get utilized during the Voice activity periods to transmit the
received voice payloads over the air interface and it gets unused during the Voice inactivity periods, which is a
critical drawback. Semi persistent scheduling addresses this drawback in a unique way.

As shown above, whenever the Voice Payloads arrive at the L2, the MAC Scheduler will activate the SPS
resources and whenever there are no transmissions for few of the transmission opportunities, the SPS
resources were implicitly released. Again, it gets activated, when the voice payloads arrives at the next Voice
activity period. During the Voice Inactivity period and after the implicit release of the SPS resources, these radio
resources will be allocated for different UEs, which are in need of it. It is clear that, only those services, which
are real time in nature, with fixed packet size payloads, and fixed periodicity of the payload arrival, can
effectively and efficiently utilize. The Semi-Persistent Scheduling. Such services or applications, which fulfils
these characteristics are conversational voice, conversational video [only Conversational voice part of the video],
and any other real time applications [Only Conversational Voice part]

Pankaj Sharma
21

Different Types of Schedulers:

 Round Robin: The RR scheduler selects and schedules UEs in a round robin manner, thereby creating
an equal resource share. The disadvantage of this approach is that UEs with sub-optimalCQIs may be
allocated Physical Radio Resources (PRBs), thus reducing the overall cell throughput.
 Max CQI : The max-CQI scheduler selects the schedulable UEs based on the experienced CQI. The
UEs with the highest CQI therefore become candidates for scheduling thereby increasing the overall cell
throughput. The disadvantage of this approach is that UEs with lower CQI are denied scheduling
instances, thus being starved for throughput and leading to degraded user experience.
 Proportional Fair: The PFS is expected to strike a balance between the traditional Round Robin (RR)
scheduler and the max Throughput Scheduler (also known max-CQI (Channel Quality Indicator)
scheduler). The PFS scheduler performs in such a manner that it considers resource fairness as well as
maximizing cell throughput (in addition to other possible
performance metrics).

For a Max C/I scheduler, the Sector throughput improves while cell edge throughput drops compared to a PF
scheduler where sector throughput may not be as good as Max C/I but cell edge throughput thoroughly
improves.

Scheduler Type Max C/I Round Robin Proportional Fair (PF)

How it works Allocates resources to the Resources are shared Sharing the cell
user with the across users over time throughput but as a
instantaneous best RF regardless of the RF function of RF conditions
conditions. UE with the conditions. and bearer
best channel conditions is priorities
always prioritized

Pros Very Good Resources shared in an Trade-off between

Throughput equal manner fairness and cell
throughput

Cons Cell Edge UEs starved of UEs with sub optimal Implementation
scheduling instances CQI conditions will reduce complexity
leading to degraded user the cell throughput and overall cell
experience. throughput will not be the
highest

Pankaj Sharma