Method and apparatus for spectrum analysis

• US 6,584,175 B1
• Filed: 11/12/1999
• Issued: 06/24/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 09/08/1995
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: AT&T Mobility II LLC (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Wireless Services Incorporated (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Raffel, Michael Allen, Kibria, Masud
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, DUC MINH
• Application Number:
  US09/439,015
• Time in Patent Office: 1,320 Days
• Field of Search: 379/1.01, 379/1.03, 455/67-- 6, 455/422-425, 455/437, 455/456-457, 455/226.1, 455/226.2, 455/226.4, 455/418, 455/419
• US Class Current: 379/1.03
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/24 Arrangements for testing
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/00 Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements

Abstract

A method and apparatus for remote spectrum analysis is disclosed. A channel measurement device is configured to receive and measure the radio spectrum in a geographic location during a measurement phase of operation. A microprocessor processes the signals and stores processed data on a storage device. The channel measurement device contains a communications interface to a land line telephone network and/or a cellular telephone network. During a data transfer phase of operation, the channel measurement device sends the processed data to a remote processor via the land line or cellular telephone network. In addition, the remote processor may act as a remote user interface to control the operation of the channel measurement device. In particular, the remote processor may be used to store values for user programmable configuration parameters in a memory of the channel measurement device via the land line or cellular telephone network. In one embodiment, the cellular telephone network interface may include the components necessary for communicating directly with the cellular telephone network. In another embodiment, the cellular telephone network interface is capable of connecting to a cellular telephone for such communication with the cellular telephone network.

Claims

1. An apparatus for spectrum analysis, comprising:

a cellular telephone; and

a channel measurement device that includes a memory, a processor coupled to the memory, and a cellular telephone interface, the processor, memory, and cellular telephone interface adapted such that signal measurements made by the cellular telephone are provided to the memory for storage via the cellular telephone interface, and such that configuration parameters received via the cellular telephone and the cellular telephone interface are provided to the memory for storage and applied by the processor to configure signal measurement by the cellular telephone.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the processor, memory, and cellular telephone interface are further adapted such that the signal measurements made by the cellular telephone and stored in the memory are provided to the cellular telephone by the channel measurement device via the cellular telephone interface for communication to a remote processor.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, the configuration parameters comprising:

identifications of channels for the cellular telephone to measure.

4. The apparatus of claim 3, the configuration parameters comprising:

an amount of time for the cellular telephone to spend measuring each of the channels.

5. The apparatus of claim 3, the configuration parameters comprising:

a total time to spend measuring the channels.

6. The apparatus of claim 3, the configuration parameters comprising:

a time at which the signal measurements are to be provided to the cellular telephone for transfer to the remote processor.

13. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the channel measurement device includes a wireless modem coupled to receive the configuration parameters from the cellular telephone, the wireless modem adapted to convert the configuration parameters to a format appropriate for processing by the processor.

14. The apparatus of claim 13 wherein the wireless modem and the processor are coupled to the cellular telephone via the cellular telephone interface.

7. A method for spectrum analysis, comprising:

receiving, via a cellular telephone, configuration parameters to configure the measurement of a radio spectrum;

providing the configuration parameters to a channel measurement device via a cellular telephone interface;

applying the configuration parameters to the cellular telephone with the channel measurement device via the cellular telephone interface;

measuring the radio spectrum with the cellular telephone according to the configuration parameters to produce signal measurements;

storing the signal measurements in a memory of the channel measurement device;

providing the stored signal measurements to the cellular telephone with the channel measurement device; and

communicating the stored signal measurements to a remote processor with the cellular telephone.

8. The method of claim 7, the configuration parameters comprising:

identifications of channels for the cellular telephone to measure.

9. The method of claim 7, the configuration parameters comprising:

an amount of time for the cellular telephone to spend measuring each of the channels.

10. The method of claim 7, the configuration parameters comprising:

a total time to spend measuring the channels.

11. The method of claim 7, the configuration parameters comprising:

a time at which the signal measurements are to be provided to by the channel measurement device to the cellular telephone for transfer to the remote processor.

15. The method of claim 7 further comprising:

providing the configuration parameters to a wireless modem to convert the configuration parameters to a format appropriate for processing by the channel measurement device.

16. The method of claim 7 further comprising:

receiving the signal measurements from the memory and converting the signal measurements to a format appropriate for transfer over a cellular telephone network; and

communicating the converted signal measurements to the cellular telephone via the cellular telephone interface.

12. A channel measurement device, comprising:

a cellular telephone interface;

a processor coupled to receive, via the cellular telephone interface, signal measurement configuration parameters, the processor further coupled to receive, via the cellular telephone interface, signal measurements generated by a cellular telephone;

a memory coupled to receive the signal measurements from the processor and to store the signal measurements; and

a wireless modem coupled to receive the signal measurements from the memory and adapted to convert the signal measurements to a format appropriate for transfer over a cellular telephone network, the wireless modem coupled to communicate the converted signal measurements to the cellular telephone via the cellular telephone interface.