Method for determining cell boundary during base station deployment
First Claim
1. A method of obtaining, for base station deployment purposes, a determination of whether a wireless handset at a location is inside or outside a cell boundary of a base station, said method comprising the steps of:
- (a) the wireless handset transmitting a test signal from the location, said signal carrying a transmitted test sequence of bits;
(b) the base station receiving from the wireless handset a received signal carrying a received sequence of bits;
(c) the base station measuring a received signal strength intensity (RSSI) level for the received signal;
(d) the base station measuring a high resolution bit error rate (BER) level for the received sequence, with reference to the transmitted test sequence;
(e) the base station making the determination that the handset is outside the cell boundary if the measured RSSI-level is less than an RSSI threshold;
(f) the base station making the determination that the handset is outside the cell boundary if the BER-level exceeds a BER threshold; and
(g) the base station indicating the determination.
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Accused Products
Abstract
An improved radio deployment tool (RDT) for determining cell boundaries is disclosed. An RDT used to carry-out active deployment procedures consists of an RDT wireless handset (RDTWH) that a deployment engineer uses to generate test signals, and an RDT base station (RDTBS) that is used to measure the RSSI of the test signals sent by the RDTWH. The RDTBS factors in the impact of short-term fades and dispersion, as well as long-term fading, by measuring and processing bit error rate (BER) and received signal strength intensity (RSSI) levels. BER levels can be measured for signals whose RSSI-levels have been driven into a testing range at which signals are susceptible to short-term fades and dispersion. A sufficient resolution of BER measurements is achieved by filling the payload fields of test packets exchanged by the RDTWH and RDTBS, with BER test data. The payload fields of the test packets can be filled by pressing down the mute button of the RDTWH.
44 Citations
34 Claims
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1. A method of obtaining, for base station deployment purposes, a determination of whether a wireless handset at a location is inside or outside a cell boundary of a base station, said method comprising the steps of:
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(a) the wireless handset transmitting a test signal from the location, said signal carrying a transmitted test sequence of bits; (b) the base station receiving from the wireless handset a received signal carrying a received sequence of bits; (c) the base station measuring a received signal strength intensity (RSSI) level for the received signal; (d) the base station measuring a high resolution bit error rate (BER) level for the received sequence, with reference to the transmitted test sequence; (e) the base station making the determination that the handset is outside the cell boundary if the measured RSSI-level is less than an RSSI threshold; (f) the base station making the determination that the handset is outside the cell boundary if the BER-level exceeds a BER threshold; and (g) the base station indicating the determination. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
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14. A method of obtaining, for base station deployment purposes, a determination of whether a wireless handset at a location is inside or outside a cell boundary of a base station, said method comprising the steps of:
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(a) the wireless handset transmitting a test signal from the location, said signal carrying a transmitted test sequence of bits; (b) the base station receiving from the wireless handset a received signal carrying a received sequence of bits; (c) the base station measuring a received signal strength intensity (RSSI) level for the received signal; (d) the base station measuring a high resolution bit error rate (BER) level for the received sequence, with reference to the transmitted test sequence; (e) the base station making the determination that the handset is outside the cell boundary if the measured RSSI-level is less than an RSSI threshold; (f) the base station making the determination that the handset is outside the cell boundary if the BER-level exceeds a BER threshold; and (g) the base station indicating the determination; wherein the step of the wireless handset transmitting the test signal further comprises the step of scrambling a known test sequence of bits to produce the transmitted test sequence, and wherein the step of the base station measuring a high resolution bit error rate (BER) further comprises the step of extracting a scrambled received sequence of bits from the received signal, and descrambling the scrambled received sequence to produce the received sequence.
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15. A method of obtaining, for base station deployment purposes, a determination of whether a wireless handset at a location is inside or outside a cell boundary of a base station, said method comprising the steps of:
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(a) the wireless handset transmitting a test signal from the location, said signal carrying a transmitted test sequence of bits; (b) the base station receiving from the wireless handset a received signal carrying a received sequence of bits; (c) the base station measuring a received signal strength intensity (RSSI) level for the received signal; (d) the base station measuring a high resolution bit error rate (BER) level for the received sequence, with reference to the transmitted test sequence; (e) the base station making the determination that the handset is outside the cell boundary if the measured RSSI-level is less than an RSSI threshold; (f) the base station making the determination that the handset is outside the cell boundary if the BER-level exceeds a BER threshold; and (g) the base station indicating the determination; wherein the step of the wireless handset transmitting a test signal includes the step of a user activating the mute feature of the wireless handset thereby resulting in the transmitted test sequence being entirely comprised of zero-bits, and wherein the step of the base station measuring a high resolution BER-level includes the step of counting the number of non-zero bits in the received sequence.
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16. A method of obtaining, for base station deployment purposes, a determination of whether a wireless handset at a location is inside or outside a cell boundary of a base station, said method comprising the steps of:
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the wireless handset transmitting a plurality of test signals from the location, each signal containing a respective transmitted sequence; the base station receiving through a receive path a plurality of received signals, each containing a respective received sequence; the base station inserting a selectable, known and varying attenuation in the receive path, to generate RDT-attenuated signals; the base station estimating an average RSSI-level of the received signals not including the attenuation; the base station calculating a high resolution bit error rate (BER) level of each RDT-attenuated signal, with reference to its respective transmitted sequence; the base station making the determination on the basis of the average RSSI-level and the calculated BER-levels; and the base station indicating the determination. - View Dependent Claims (17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25)
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26. A radio deployment tool (RDT) comprising:
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a wireless handset comprising means for transmitting a test signal containing a transmitted test sequence to the base station; and a base station comprising means for receiving a received signal from the wireless handset, an RSSI detector for measuring the received signal strength intensity (RSSI) level of the received signal, a processor for calculating a bit error rate (BER) of a received sequence carried by the received signal and for comparing the RSSI and the BER-levels to RSSI and BER thresholds, respectively, in making a determination that the handset is outside a cell boundary of the base station if the RSSI is less than the RSSI threshold and making a determination that the handset is outside a cell boundary of the base station if the BER is greater than the BER threshold, and an indicating device for communicating the determination to a user. - View Dependent Claims (27, 29)
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28. The RDT of claim 28 wherein the means for varying the RSSI-level includes adjustable attenuation pads, adjustable antennas, and means for controlling the receive-sensitivity.
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30. A radio deployment tool (RDT) comprising:
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a wireless handset comprising means for transmitting a test signal containing a transmitted test sequence to the base station; and a base station comprising means for receiving a received signal from the wireless handset, an RSSI detector for measuring the received signal strength intensity (RSSI) level of the received signal, a processor for calculating a bit error rate (BER) of a received sequence carried by the received signal and for comparing the RSSI and the BER-levels to RSSI and BER thresholds, respectively, in making a determination that the handset is outside a cell boundary of the base station if the RSSI is less than the RSSI threshold and making a determination that the handset is outside a cell boundary of the base station if the BER is greater than the BER threshold, and an indicating device for communicating the determination to a user; wherein the wireless handset further comprises a mute button for producing a known test sequence of zero-bits, and a scrambler for scrambling the known test sequence thereby producing the transmitted test sequence, and wherein the base station further comprises a descrambler for descrambling the contents of a scrambled received sequence thereby creating the received sequence, and a processor for counting the number of non-zero bits in the received sequence. - View Dependent Claims (31, 32, 33)
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34. A base station for obtaining, for base station deployment purposes, a determination of whether or not a location falls outside or inside its cell boundary, the apparatus comprising, an RSSI detector for measuring the received signal strength intensity (RSSI) level of a received signal originating from the location, a processor for measuring the bit error rate (BER) level of a received sequence carried by the received signal and for considering both levels in making the determination such that if the BER fails a respective threshold test the determination is made that the location falls outside the cell boundary, and if the RSSI fails a respective threshold test the determination is made that the location falls outside the cell boundary, and an indicating device for communicating the determination.
Specification