5 Results
Best practices for mobile network testing for business-critical applications
Business-critical infrastructure: Industrial applications require extremely high reliability and availability, as any downtime can result in significant financial losses. Fundamental requirements: Industrial applications often require low latency and even more important a sustainable latency to ensure real-time communication and control. Measurement Techniques: As soon as the radio access network is used, innovative testing methods are needed beforehand to proactively test the network capability and to identify any potential issues. We propose a standard test procedure for the characterization of a network regarding industrial use-cases that covers a representative set of different, common types of network traffic.
13-Aug-2024 | AN-No. 8NT17
5G NR Reduced Capabilities (RedCap) network scanning
Purpose of RedCap: RedCap is designed for use cases requiring reasonable data throughput, cost-efficient devices, reduced power consumption and smaller device footprint to support applications like wireless industrial sensors, video surveillance and smart wearables in which ultralow latency isn’t essential.Technology basics: Understanding the technology basics helps facing configuration complexities and avoiding potential coexistence issues with regular 5G.RedCap field verification: New mobile network technology introductions like 5G RedCap benefit from field measurements during their typical life-cycle phases (engineering, network roll-out, and operation).Measurement Techniques: In early phases of new technologies, passive network measurements using network scanners are reliable and effective in detecting actual network and cell configurations.
23-Apr-2024 | AN-No. 8NT13
Best practices for national regulatory authorities
Key points:Importance of field measurements: Traditional network planning tools and models only offer an estimated view of mobile coverage. Field measurements are conducted under real geographical and load conditions, and therefore provide a more accurate picture and can discover interferences more effectively. Coverage investigations: When deploying a mobile network, operators must adhere to regulatory standards and licensing conditions. As a result, regulatory authorities carry out field measurements on a regular or ad hoc basis to validate compliance or investigate customer complaints. This process identifies coverage gaps and areas of poor network quality, enabling regulatory authorities to take actions to enhance service quality for consumers and guide network expansion.Foster competition: If the field measurements of the coverage and performance are performed on a scale representative of a given country, the transparency of these results can promote healthy competition between operators and better service for consumers, which is essential for economic growth and social development.Measurement Techniques: The harmonized methodology for measuring and evaluating data throughput and QoE based on popular services is described in ETSI TR 103 559.
15-Apr-2024 | AN-No. 8NT14
Mobile network operators worldwide face cost pressures and escalating network complexity. The advent of 5G-NR has ushered in new use cases and flexibility, but it also comes with more stringent performance and availability requirements.Machine Learning can serve as a catalyst for the market to unearth deep insights that would otherwise remain concealed. It can also significantly streamline everyday tasks by fostering a smarter system that guides users through their routine work processes, rather than obliging them to repeat each (manual) step. Rohde & Schwarz Mobile Network Testing has focused its efforts on delivering Machine Learning use cases that distill relevant insights from drive testing data, thereby offering substantial benefits to users.This educational note explains the motivation and reasoning why this kind of approach is needed, what are the benefits of the machine learning offering and it takes a deeper look into how it can be used in various levels of statistical and technical analysis. Finally, this document provides real measurement results and analysis findings based on the Rohde & Schwarz post processing SW suite SmartAnalytics and its machine learning based features Call Stability Score and Network Utilization Rating.
28-Feb-2024 | AN-No. 8NT10
Modern societies worldwide depend on the performance, reliability and security of critical infrastructures and networks. There is a plethora of “new verticals” such as manufacturing, warehouse, mining, ports or other critical infrastructure, just to name a few. These “new vertical” use cases all have one common requirement: the mobile network needs to provide a superior performance compared to a commercial mobile network. In such environments 5G brings new capabilities to build fast and secure campus or private networks tuned to higher performance, which can increase productivity and efficiency. To be successful in these business-critical use cases, the wireless networks need to be as reliable as the wired ones. This educational note describes the different test methods to be able to verify the superior network performance and to help finding root causes of potential problems limiting the performance. We distinguish between passive tests and active tests.
11-Aug-2023 | AN-No. 8NT09