DROP CS VOICE Analysis

Failure counters

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DNO Optimization Processes / JC Ejarque

RAB Setup & Access and Active

UE

RNC

BTS

CN

RRC Connection Active Phase, UE-CN Signalling

RANAP: RAB Assignment Request

RAB Access failures are not

so Common

RAB SETUP fails if some of the needed resources (RNC, BTS, AIR,
Transport) are not available. When an RAB setup failure occurs the
RNC sends a RANAP: RAB ASSINGMENT RESPONSE message to
the CN with an appropriate failure cause

RAB SETUP phase

RAB Setup time

(Resource Reservation in RNC, BTS, Transport)

RRC: Radio Bearer Setup
RAB ACCESS phase
(RNC waits for Reply from UE)
RRC: RB Setup Complete
RANAP: RAB Assignment Response

RAB ACCESS fails if the UE replies with an RRC: RADIO BEARER

SETUP FAILURE message or the connection cannot be established in a
give time. When a RAB access failure occurs, the RNC sends a
RANAP: RAB ASSINGMENT RESPONSE message to the CN with an
appropriate failure cause. Immediately after this, the RNC sends also a
RANAP: IU RELEASE REQUEST to the CN and waits for RANAP: IU
RELEASE COMMAND message

RAB ACTIVE phase

(User Plane Data Transfer)
RAB Holding Time

RANAP: RAB Assignment Request with IE: RAB reconfiguration

RAB Reconfiguration Actions
(Reconfigure RAB resources in RNC, BTS, Transport)

RRC: RB Reconfiguration
RRC: RB Reconfiguration Complete
RANAP: RAB Assignment Response
RANAP: RAB Assignment Request with IE: RAB Release
RRC: Radio Bearer Release
RRC: Radio Bearer Release Complete
RANAP: RAB Assignment Response
Release RAB resources in RNC, BTS,
Transmission

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RANOP2 - M2/January 2011

RAB ACTIVE fails when an interface related (Iu, Iur, Iub, or Radio) or
RNC internal failure occurs, and the failure causes the release of the
RAB connection.

If the UE has more than one RAB connection and the failure is not so
critical that it would lease to an RRC Connection drop, only the failed
RAB connection is released. The RNC sends a RANAP: RAB
RELEASE REQUEST message to the CN and waits for a RANAP: RAB
RELEASE COMMAND or RANAP: IU RELASE COMMAND from CN
Otherwise, both the RRC connection and RAB connection (s) are
released. The RNC send a RANAP: IU RELASE REQUEST message to
the CN and waits for a RANAP: IU RELEASE COMMAND MESSAGE
from the CN

RETAINABILITY CONCEPT
Retainability is the ability of a service to be kept once it was accessed under given
conditions for a requested period
of time. In other words, it is the probability that a service, once obtained, will continue to be
provided under given conditions for a given time duration.
Target is to get a 100% Retainability, i.e., all connections maintained until their normal release.
Poor Retainability is typically due to
Handover performance (soft/softer/Iur/IFHO/IRAT) and missing neighbor cell
UL/DL imbalance
Incorrect parameter settings (power, admission, release)
Congestion
Radio environment impact (corner effect, fast Ec/No drop, Pilot pollution, etc)
Node Hardware/Software failure
Iub (E1s) Congestion

Retainability is to be monitored independently for the different RAB types (e.g. Speech, CS
Video, PS Interactive R99, PS Interactive HSDPA, etc.) as in certain situations only one of the
RAB types will be affected.

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DNO Optimization Processes / JC Ejarque

Retainability Rate - RR (%)

Based in statistical counters, it is possible to count every time a RAB is normally
released, e.g.:
Call ended by UE or user control
(user generates a disconnect towards the CN or UE Signaling Connection Release)
Call ended because of any problem or action on the other part
(the monitored user receives a disconnect from the CN)
Connection ends because of user inactivity (PS calls only)
Connection ends because the call is successfully transferred to another system
(IRAT handover)
and abnormally released (= DROP):

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RETAINABILITY -II
Normal Releases (of NSN Packet Call) counters are updated, for example,
due to inactivity or RAB release. The
counters are also updated in case of outgoing SRNC relocations, outgoing
Inter-RNC hard handovers, Inter-System hard
handovers, and state transitions to DCH (0/0)/FACH/PCH.

Abnormal (=Failure) Releases (of NSN Packet Call) counters are updated in
case of Radio Link failures, preemption
and RT over NRT. In case of RL failure, all radio links go out of sync state during
a packet call, and as a consequence,
the dedicated user plane allocation is released and the call is dropped into the
Cell_FACH or Cell_PCH state. The counter for
other failures is updated when a packet call is released due to some other
failure cause than a radio link failure, pre-emption, or
RT over NRT

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DNO Optimization Processes / JC Ejarque

PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS
RADIO: Radio coverage issues:
Uplink problems
Downlink problems

BTS: Mobility issues:

Handover failures
Missing neighbor relations
IRAT/IF handover issues

PRE-EMPTION: Capacity issues

Other faults (Iu, Iur, UE, Unspecified Errors, RNC).

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DNO Optimization Processes / JC Ejarque

PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS--II
Radio Coverage Issues
Any condition related to the radio links propagation that can lead to lose the radio
synchronization either from the UE
side (DOWNLINK) or from the Node B side (UPLINK).
Typically the problem is due to high path loss and/or interference.
Typical reasons for uplink problems:
High pathloss: UE is too far from the site or the propagation is blocked by
obstacles. This condition could be checked by
evaluating some environment indicators
High UL interference: the RBS cannot receive the UE because of high UL
interference. This condition can be checked by UL RSSI monitoring counters
:
.
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Downlink problem

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DNO Optimization Processes / JC Ejarque

COVERAGE INDICATORS
Primary Straight Indicators
CPICH RSCP (the signal strength of the pilot channel) Samples at low level (<-105 dBm) means high
pathloss
problems. If the service should perform IRAT HO or IF HO (e.g. speech) this could be a problem in the
IRAT/IF settings.
CPICH Ec/No (the signal to total interference ratio) Samples at low level (<-13 dB) means poor signal
quality. If the
service should perform IRAT HO or IF HO (e.g. speech) this could be a problem in the IRAT/IF settings.
UE Tx Power (the UE transmitted power) Samples at high level (>+15 dBm) means UL problems. It could
be again
high pathloss or high UL interference.

Secondary Indicators
Some clues to detect bad radio coverage conditions by standard counters:
Compressed Mode activation events (IRAT of IF measurement activation)/ Traffic Erlang of
services that can start CM (Speech, PsR99).

Compressed mode average number of users / Traffic Erlang of services that can start CM
(Speech, PS R99)
Number of IRAT execution/ Normal RAB releases.
CQI Distribution
CELL_UPD_ATT_RE_ENT_S_AREA (number of cell update attempts due to a re-entered service
area)

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CPICH_ECNO_CLASS

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Mobility Issues
Mobility Issues
This Intrafrequency HO, Interfrequency HO (IFHO) and IRAT HO, in those aspects with
impact in Retainability:
Soft/Softer Handover failures

Missing neighbor relations

IRAT Handover failures
IF Handover Failures
When UE in connected mode moves within a WCDMA carrier it should always stay
connected with the best cells,
otherwise:
The downlink connection quality will deeply decrease because of the interference of the
strongest (non-used) cell. (Each
cell acts as interferer for the others)
The UE shall generate high UL interference in the closest (non-used) cell.
NODEB

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Soft/Softer Handover Failures

Most common reason to have handover failure is because the target cell cannot
accept incoming call due to admission block or failure in other resources allocation
failure (e.g. transport or DL channelization code).

Also the RL Setup or RL Addition procedures may fail (NBAP Radio link Setup
Failure / NBAP Radio link Addition Failure received) or the Active Set
Update procedure fails (RRC Active Set Update Failure received) or Active Set
Update procedure times out in the UE.

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IF Handover Failures
Inter-Frequency HOs are also hard handovers. Also here the
possibilities are: the UE succeeds in handover to the target carrier
(Successful IF HO)
the UE fails in getting the target carrier and comes back to the original
carrier (IF HO Failure)
A correct definition of neighbors is critical for both IRAT and IF HO.
For IF HO the Neighbors definition could be even more difficult:
Isolated or border second layer cells could have a very large and
unpredicted coverage extension because they are not
limited by the surrounding
On the other hand the target WCDMA cells will be only available in the
area where they are the best, in other positions they will be really
interfered and cannot be used
the UE fails in getting the target carrier and also fails to get back to the
original carrier (lost call = IF drop)
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RAB SETUP PHASE

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RAB Success Ratio (Drop call rate)

Call is dropped if one (or more) of the following RAB, RB or RL, drops.
PS call drop is different than the other call type drops, RAB service can
still exits even if the RB and/or RL drops
Poor RAB success ratio could be reason of coverage or interference
issues, SHO problems, missing neighbour, inter RNC problems, just to
mention some
Call Drop rate (CDR) is calculated based on RAB activation failures, it can
be defined separately for different services
Normal RAB releases are taken into account
Drops during the signalling are not included

RNC_231d RAB success ratio, AMR

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RANOP2_M1/January 2011

Call Drop Analysis Overview

Top (N) drops

Cell and its Neighbour

Cells availability
Alarms/Tickets

Neighbours Performance
(use SHO success per adjs
counters to identify badly
performing neighbours) & Map

Site OK ?

Traffic

Audit adjacent sites for

alarms, Availability,
configuration and capacity

YES
NO

Configuration &
Parameter audit

Conf OK ?
3G Cell at RNC
border?

YES

SHO
Success
Rate <
90%?

SHO

ISHO
Failures

Analyse last detailed

radio measurements

NO

RF and IFHO neighbour

optimisation

3G cell covers
over a
coverage hole?

3G cell at interRNC border ?

No cell
found ratio
>40 %

Investigation Iur

New site ?

YES
Top
issu
es

Iur
performance

YES

NO

ISHO

YES

RF and ISHO neighbour

optimisation

YES

2G Cell Doctor
NO

2G Investigation : TCH
blocking or TCH seizure
failure (interference)

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YES

ISHO
Success
Rate < 90%

RANOP2 - M2/January 2011

No cell found
ratio > 90 %
and enough
ADJG

Wrong reference clock

(10MHz tuning)

Call Drop analysis

1. Check high call drop cells and its neighbouring cells of any faulty alarms
2. Identify call drop root cause failure distribution and main failure
contributor (radio, Iu, BTS, Iur, MS, RNC)
3. Check SHO KPI if performance < 90% ( leads to radio failure)
Check if cells are at RNC border (check Iur capacity and SRNC relocation

problem)
Detect badly performing neighbours using HO success rate per adjacency
counters (M1013)
High incoming HO failure rate in all ADJS check sync alarms
Assessing neighbor list plan and visualization check with map
Evaluate HO control parameters and trigger threshold

4. Check ISHO KPI if RT ISHO < 90% or NRT < 80% (leads to radio
failure)
Check missing neighbour (M1015), GSM frequency plan neighbour RNC and

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MSC database consistency audit, check alarm of reference clock in 3G or in

2G, check 2G TCH congestion
Check RRC Drop ISHO RT / NRT

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RANOP2 - M2/January 2011

Call Drop analysis

5. Detecting DL or UL path loss problem if RAB drop due to radio (dominant call
drop cause > 50%)
Check ASU failure rate (UNSUC_ASU) which link to NO RESPONSE FROM
RLC
Check Call reestablishment timer -> T315 (rec.10s)
Ecno distribution for bad coverage issue (M1007C38-M1007C47)
6. Check core network parameter setting if RAB_ACT_FAIL_XXX_IU
Check SCCP SGSN/RNC IuPS Tias/Tiar if RAB_ACT_FAIL_BACKG_IU
7. If high RAB_ACT_FAIL_XXX_BTS
Check if any BTS faulty alarm (7653 cell faulty alarm)
If no alarms, COCO detach/attach
8. If high RAB_ACT_FAIL_XXX_MS
Check physical channel reconfiguration failure rate (IFHO, ISHO, code optimisation)

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RANOP2 - M2/January 2011

RAB & RRC Active Failures

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RAB and RRC active failure reasons:

RNC Internal
UE
RNC
CORE
BTS
RAB Assignment Request (setup)
UE
Radio Interface
Radio Bearer Setup
Iur
Radio Bearer Setup Complete
Iu
Ciphering
Integrity check
RAB Assignment Response
RAB and RRC normal release:
RAB active complete
RAB Assignment Request (release)
Pre-emption
Iu Release Command
SRNC Relocation
RAB Assignment Response
Iu Release Request
HHO, ISHO, GANHO
Unspecific error in CN

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R5 : RAB active failures - Voice

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FINAL IMP COUNTER

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DROP CS VOICE :MAJOR COUNTER

For the RAB Active phase, the majority of failure causes are:

RAB Active Fail due to Radio

Basically refers to coverage issues. L1 Synchronization needs to be verified.

Check Ec/No distribution for bad coverage. SHO and ISHO KPI to be verified
Assessing neighbor list plan and visualization check with map.
Check for missing neighbours, GSM frequency plan, neighbour RNC and MSC
database consistency audit,

check alarm of reference clock in 3G or in 2G, check 2G TCH congestion.

Measures to improve coverage such as RF tuning or parameters fine-tuning can be
carried out.

RAB Active Fail due to UE Measure Physical Channel Reconfiguration Failure Rate

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Thank you

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DNO Optimization Processes / JC Ejarque