SIGNAL STRENGTH INDICATOR FOR MULTICAST BROADCASTING IN A WIRELESS NETWORK

• US 20150078179A1
• Filed: 09/17/2013
• Published: 03/19/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 09/17/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Cellco Partnership, Inc. (Verizon Communications Inc.), Verizon Patent and Licensing Incorporated (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Cellco Partnership, Inc. (Verizon Communications Inc.), Verizon Patent and Licensing Incorporated (Verizon Communications Inc.)
• Inventors: Lui, Danny Chick-Leung, Gu, John, Aguirre, Sergio, Guven, Musa Kazim, Chandwani, Rakesh H
• Granted Patent: US 9,277,345 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/252
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 17/318 Received signal strength
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/00 Substation equipment, e.g. for use by subscribers subscriber services or facilities provided at exchanges H04M3/00; prepayment telephone coin boxes H04M17/00; current supply arrangements H04M19/08
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/00 Services specially adapted for wireless communication networks; Facilities therefor
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/06 Selective distribution of broadcast services, e.g. multimedia broadcast multicast service [MBMS]; Services to user groups; One-way selective calling services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 48/16 Discovering, processing access restriction or access information

Abstract

The quality of a multicast broadcast that is being received by a mobile device may be determined. In one implementation, a method may include receiving a radio signal corresponding to a multicast broadcast of content; measuring a strength of the received signal; determining a minimum signal strength to receive the content associated with the multicast broadcast; determining a signal quality metric, associated with the multicast broadcast, the signal quality metric being based on a difference between the measured strength of the signal and the determined minimum signal strength; and providing a visual indication of the signal quality metric.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving, by a mobile device, a radio signal corresponding to a multicast broadcast of content;

measuring, by the mobile device, a strength of the received radio signal;

determining, by the mobile device, a minimum signal strength to receive the content associated with the multicast broadcast;

determining, by the mobile device, a signal quality metric, associated with the multicast broadcast, the signal quality metric being based on a difference between the measured strength of the radio signal and the determined minimum signal strength; and

providing, by the mobile device, a visual indication of the signal quality metric.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein determining the minimum signal strength further includes:

querying a table, stored by the mobile device, based on a particular modulation coding scheme (MCS) being used to broadcast the content, a particular symbol rate being used to broadcast the content, and an identification of a Multicast Service Single Frequency Network (MBSFN) area associated with the received signal.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

performing a quantization of the signal quality metric to obtain a value associated with the visual indication.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the value associated with the visual indication includes a binary value.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the value associated with the visual indication includes a number representing a number of bars to provide to a user of the mobile device.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein determining the minimum signal strength further comprises:

querying a first data structure to initially determine the minimum signal strength;

querying a second data structure to determine an offset value; and

modifying the initially determined minimum signal strength by the offset value.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the first data structure and the second data structure include tables that are pre-stored at the mobile device.

8. The method of claim 6, wherein the first and second data structures are received from a network associated with the multicast broadcast.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the signal quality metric is determined on a per-multicast signal basis.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the strength of the received radio signal is measured as a signal to noise ratio (SNR) of the radio signal.

11. A mobile device comprising:

a memory; and

at least one processor to execute instructions in the memory to;

receive a radio signal corresponding to a multicast broadcast of content,

measure a strength of the received radio signal,

determine a minimum signal strength to receive the content associated with the multicast broadcast,

determine a signal quality metric, associated with the multicast broadcast, the signal quality metric being based on a difference between the measured strength of the signal and the determined minimum signal strength, and

provide a visual indication of the signal quality metric.

12. The mobile device of claim 11, wherein, when determining the minimum signal strength, the at least one processor is to further execute instructions in the memory to:

query a table, stored by the mobile device, based on a particular modulation coding scheme (MCS) being used to broadcast the content, a particular symbol rate being used to broadcast the content, and an identification of a Multicast Service Single Frequency Network (MBSFN) area associated with the received signal.

13. The mobile device of claim 11, wherein the at least one processor is to further execute instructions in the memory to:

performing a quantization of the signal quality metric to obtain a value associated with the visual indication.

14. The mobile device of claim 13, wherein the value associated with the visual indication includes a binary value.

15. The mobile device of claim 13, wherein the value associated with the visual indication includes a number representing a number of bars to provide to a user of the mobile device.

16. The device of claim 11, wherein, determining the minimum signal strength, the at least one processor is to further execute instructions in the memory to:

query a first data structure to initially determine the minimum signal strength;

query a second data structure to determine an offset value; and

modify the initially determined minimum signal strength by the offset value.

17. The device of claim 16, wherein the first and second data structures are received from a network associated with the multicast broadcast.

18. The device of claim 16, wherein the first data structure and the second data structure include tables that are pre-stored at the mobile device.

19. A method comprising:

receiving, by mobile device, a radio signal corresponding to a multicast broadcast of content;

measuring, by the mobile device, a strength of the received radio signal;

determining, by the mobile device, a first value corresponding to a theoretical minimum signal strength needed to receive the content associated with the multicast broadcast;

determining, by the mobile device, a second value, corresponding to an adjustment amount, to the first value, the adjustment amount being determined based on experimentation;

determining, by the mobile device, a signal quality metric, associated with the multicast broadcast, based on the measured strength of the received radio signal, the first value, and the second value; and

providing, by the mobile device, a visual indication of the signal quality metric.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein determining the first value includes:

calculating the first value based on a particular modulation coding scheme (MCS) being used to broadcast the content, a particular symbol rate being used to broadcast the content, and an identification of a Multicast Service Single Frequency Network (MBSFN) area associated with the received signal.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein determining the second value includes:

querying a table, stored by the mobile device, based on a particular modulation coding scheme (MCS) being used to broadcast the content, a particular symbol rate being used to broadcast the content, and an identification of a Multicast Service Single Frequency Network (MBSFN) area associated with the received signal.

22. The method of claim 21, where values in the table are received over a control channel associated with the multicast broadcast.