M900/M1800 Base Station Subsystem Signaling Analysis Manual

Contents

Contents
4 Immediate Assignment Procedure .........................................................................................4-1
4.1 Overview of the Immediate Assignment Procedure ......................................................................................4-2 4.2 Immediate Assignment Procedure.................................................................................................................4-2 4.3 Signaling Procedure in the BSC....................................................................................................................4-5 4.4 Abnormal Cases and Troubleshooting...........................................................................................................4-6 4.4.1 Not Receiving Establish Indication After Channel Activation.............................................................4-6 4.4.2 Immediate Assignment Reject from the BSC ......................................................................................4-6

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Figure 4-1 Immediate assignment procedure .....................................................................................................4-3

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Section

Immediate Assignment Procedure

About This Chapter

The following table lists the contents of this chapter. Describes The purpose of the immediate assignment procedure and the reference protocols. A normal immediate assignment procedure and the related signaling content. The internal handling of the BSC during an immediate assignment procedure. The abnormal cases in the immediate assignment procedures and how to troubleshoot them.

4.1 Overview of the Immediate Assignment Procedure 4.2 Immediate Assignment Procedure 4.3 Signaling Procedure in the BSC 4.4 Abnormal Cases and Troubleshooting

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4.1 Overview of the Immediate Assignment Procedure

The purpose of an immediate assignment procedure is to establish a Radio Resource (RR) connection on the Um interface between an MS and the GSM network. An immediate assignment procedure is initiated by an MS. An MS initiates an immediate assignment procedure under any of the following conditions: The Mobility Management (MM) sublayer requires establishing a dedicated channel. The RR entity responds to a Paging Request message. The MS responds to the SDCCH request. The channel request of an MS is subject to the access classes of the MS and to the access classes of the cell visited by the MS. Each MS is a member of one out of 10 access classes numbered 0 to 9. In addition, an MS may be a member of one or more out of 5 special access classes numbered 11 to 15. The access classes are stored in the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM). If the establishment cause for the request of an MS is not "emergency call," access to the network is allowed only if the MS is a member of at least one authorized access class or special access class. For the immediate assignment procedure, see GSM Rec. 04.18 and 08.58.

4.2 Immediate Assignment Procedure

Figure 4-1 shows the immediate assignment procedure.

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Figure 4-1 Immediate assignment procedure

MS BTS BSC

RACH RACH

Channel Request (1) Channel Required (2) Channel Activation (3) Channel Activation Acknowledge (4) Immediate Assignment Command(5)

AGCH Start T3101 SABM (6) main DCCH UA (7) main DCCH Establish Indication (8) Stop T3101

The immediate assignment procedure is as follows: Step 1 An MS sends a Channel Request message to the BTS on the RACH. The Channel Request message contains the parameters Establish Cause and Random Reference. This message is only one octet long. The Establish Cause has a variable length from 3 bits to 6 bits, indicating the reason for requesting a connection. The Random Reference has a variable length from 5 bits to 2 bits, carrying the MS identifier. Based on a Channel Request message, up to 32 MSs can be distinguished. The response messages on the Um interface are used to further distinguish the MSs that initiate Channel Request messages simultaneously, Step 2 The BTS sends a Channel Required message to the BSC. The Channel Required message contains the Request Reference and Access Delay parameters. The Request Reference contains the random access reference value sent by the MS in the Channel Request message and the absolute frame number for receiving the access burst. The Access Delay is the delay of the access burst as measured by the BTS. Step 3 After receiving the Channel Required message, the BSC assigns a signaling channel. Then, the BSC sends a Channel Activation message to the BTS to activate a radio channel. The Channel Activation message contains the parameters Activation Type, Channel Mode, MS Power, BS Power, and Timing Advance. Step 4 After receiving the Channel Activation message, the BTS opens an RF power amplifier on the assigned channel if the channel type is correct. The BTS starts receiving messages from the MS, and sends a Channel Activation Acknowledge message to the BSC.

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This message contains the absolute frame number, which is used by the BSC to calculate the Starting Time. Step 5 The BSC sends the MS an Immediate Assignment or an Immediate Assignment Extended message. The Immediate Assignment message is sent on the AGCH. The Immediate Assignment Extended message, which contains the Immediate Assignment messages for two MSs, is used to enhance the channel usage. An Immediate Assignment message contains the following parameters: Dedicated mode or TBF This field is used by the network to indicate to an MS whether the rest of the message need to be decoded as an Immediate Assignment message allocating a dedicated channel or as the allocation of a Temporary Block Flow. Page Mode The purpose of this field is to control the action of the MS belonging to a paging subgroup. Channel Description This field describes an assigned channel and its SACCH and contains the Channel Type, TDMA offset, timeslot, and absolute RF channel number. Request Reference This field contains the random access reference value sent by the MS in the Channel Request message and the absolute frame number for receiving the access burst. Timing Advance This field provides the initial timing advance value.
If no channel is available for assignment, the BSC sends an Immediate Assignment Reject message or Immediate Assignment Extended Reject message to the MS. Upon receipt of an Immediate Assignment Reject message corresponding to one of its last three Channel Request messages, the MS starts timer T3122. Before timer T3122 expires, the MS is not allowed to make a new attempt to establish a connection. The MS returns to CCCH idle mode and listens to the paging channel. The MS is not allowed to make a new attempt to establish a non-emergency RR connection in the same cell until timer T3122 expires. Upon the first receipt of an Immediate Assignment Reject message, the MS also starts timer T3126. When the number of Channel Request messages sent by the MS reaches the maximum value, timer T3126 starts. The immediate assignment procedure fails when timer T3126 expires. Upon receipt of an Immediate Assignment message, the MS compares the received assignment instruction with the stored information in the Channel Request message to determine whether the channel is assigned to itself. If the received message corresponds to one of its last three Channel Request messages, the MS stops timer T3120 or T3160. Then the MS switches to the assigned channel and sends an SABM command to establish a main signaling link.

Step 6 The MS sends an SABM frame on the main DCCH. SABM is a command frame in the data link layer LAPDm protocol and is the first frame to establish a multiple frame acknowledged mode. The messages on the Um interface are of two types: signaling and user short messages. The message types are identified by the Service Access Point Identifier (SAPI). The service access point is the point at which the data link layer provides services to layer 3. SAPI 0 supports the transfer of signaling, and SAPI 3 supports the transfer of user short messages. In the GSM network, an SABM frame contains a signaling message, that is, a layer 3 service request message. This message contains the identity of an MS and indicates to the network which service the MS is requesting. The layer 3 service request messages are classified into the following types:

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CM service request Location updating request IMSI detach Paging response These messages contain the IMSI of the MS, detailed access cause, and the classmark of the MS.
In RR connection mode, only two channels are used as DCCHs. One channel is an SACCH, and the other channel is an SDCCH or an FACCH. The SDCCH or FACCH is called the main DCCH.

Step 7 The BTS responds with a UA frame on the main DCCH. UA is an unnumbered acknowledge frame of layer 2 LAPDm protocol. It responds to a SABM command. When two MSs send Channel Request messages with the same content at the same time, they may respond to the same dedicated channel. Upon receipt of the SABM frame, the BTS sends the MS a UA frame containing the same information as that received in the SABM frame. The SABM frame contains the IMSI number of the MS. If the information fields in the UA and SABM frame are not the same, the MS leaves this channel and starts another radio connection procedure. Only the matching MS can use the assigned channel. Step 8 The BTS sends an Establish Indication message to the BSC. This message indicates the establishment of a radio connection in multi-frame mode and contains Link Identifier and L3 Information. Link Identifier identifies the signaling channel type and the message priority of SAPI and SAPI 0. The L3 Information field contains a complete L3 message, which is previously described. ----End

4.3 Signaling Procedure in the BSC

The signaling procedure in the BSC is as follows: Step 1 Upon receipt of the CH_RQD message from the BTS, the BSC assigns a proper signaling channel based on the channel type and channel assignment algorithm required in the CH_RQD message. The channel assignment algorithm may involve Immediate Assignment TCH in Radio CH Management Ctrl. Table, HW II Channel Allocation Table, and Cell Call Control Table. Step 2 During the random access procedure, the BSC adds the CGI of the current cell to the CM_SERVICE_REQ message based on the BSC Cell List after receiving the EST_IND message from the BTS. Then the BSC sends the CM_SERVICE_REQ message to the MSC. ----End

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4.4 Abnormal Cases and Troubleshooting

4.4.1 Not Receiving Establish Indication After Channel Activation
Case Description
After receiving the Channel Activation Acknowledge message, the BSC sends an Immediate Assignment Command message to the MS but does not receive the Establish Indication message from the BTS.

Probable Causes
The cause may be one of the following: The design of the MS does not comply with protocols. Because the MS resends Channel Request messages several times, the BSS assigns and activates multiple signaling channels. Although the BSS is functional, the MS may send several Channel Request messages in one RR connection attempt. The BSS activates multiple signaling channels, but the MS uses only one of them. The BSC cannot receive Establish Indication messages from other channels and releases the channel after timer T3101 expires. If the number of slots to spread transmission (shorted as is correct, the fact is that the BTS receives the uplink signal correctly but the MS cannot receive the downlink signal. Meanwhile if the Um interface is traced on the MS side, the result shows that after sending a Channel Request message to the BTS, the BSC cannot receive response messages from the BTS. The and the CCCH configuration of the test cell are not correct. They affect the intervals at which an MS resends Channel Request messages.

Troubleshooting The troubleshooting is as follows

For the first cause Use another MS and try to establish an RR connection. For the second cause Check whether the received level and signal quality on the uplink and downlink are normal. If the MS is near to the BTS but the received level is low and the received signal quality is bad, check whether the BTS antenna system, MS antenna, and battery are running normally. For the third cause In the BSC data configuration, check whether the and the CCCH configuration are correct.

4.4.2 Immediate Assignment Reject from the BSC

Case Description
After receiving the Channel Required message, the BSC sends an Immediate Assignment Reject message to the MS.

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Probable Causes
The cause may be one of the following: The BSC does not find suitable signaling channel, that is, an SDCCH or a TCH, to assign to the MS because the channels are busy or blocked. After sending a Channel Activation message, the BSC receives a Channel Activation Negative Acknowledge message from the BTS.

Troubleshooting
The troubleshooting is as follows: For the first cause Check whether the channels are busy or blocked, and whether the TRXs are functional. To expand the cell capacity, use one of the following methods:

Adding TRXs Modifying the access threshold Opening the direct re-attempt permit switch

For the second cause If the BSC receives many Channel Activation Negative Acknowledge messages from the BTS, the cause may be either of the following:

The message transmission on the Abis interface is not stable, so the channel states of the BSC and the BTS are not consistent. One board of the BTS fails.

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