HANDOVERS

3gpp requirements
Handover due to UE Movement
It should be possible to provide a technical implementation of
handover such that there is no measurable impact on the quality of
any service when handover due to UE movement occurs. This does
not imply that all UMTS handovers will achieve this ideal. However,
the standards shall define at least one UTRA mode in which this is
possible given the following:
UE speed stays within limits for given service.
UE stays constantly within UMTS coverage of a single UTRAN.
Handover Between UMTS Modes
The standards shall permit a technical implementation in which
service is continued, although there may be a temporary degradation
which may affect teleservices at the time of handover.
Handover Between Environments
UMTS is expected to provide coverage in a number of environments
including fixed and mobile. The standard shall enable handover
between these environments as described in the table below.
 The most obvious cause for performing a handover is that due to its
movement a user can be served in another cell more efficiently (like
less power emission, less interference). It may however also be
performed for other reasons such as system load control.
Intra/inter -frequency handovers
Intra/inter -mode handovers (TDD, FDD)
Inter system handover (WCDMA, GSM)
TYPES
Hard Handover

Hard handover means that all the old radio links in the UE are
removed before the new radio links are established. Hard handover
can be seamless or non-seamless. Seamless hard handover means
that the handover is not perceptible to the user. In practice a
handover that requires a change of the carrier frequency (inter-
frequency handover) is always performed as hard handover.
 Soft Handover

Soft handover means that the radio links are added and removed in a
way that the UE always keeps at least one radio link to the UTRAN.
Soft handover is performed by means of macro diversity, which refers
to the condition that several radio links are active at the same time.
Normally soft handover can be used when cells operated on the same
frequency are changed.
 Softer handover

Softer handover is a special case of soft handover where the radio

links that are added and removed belong to the same Node B (i.e. the
site of co-located base stations from which several sector-cells are
served. In softer handover, macro diversity with maximum ratio
combining can be performed in the Node B, whereas generally in soft
handover on the downlink, macro diversity with selection combining
is applied.
Comparison between soft handover and hard handover
The Procedure and Parameter of One Possible Soft Handover Algorithm

A soft handover algorithm works with the corporation of a set of

system parameters such as adding threshold, dropping threshold and
dropping timer. In principle, if received signal strength from a new
base station is higher than adding threshold, it is added into the
users active set and starts the communication to the user. When the
signal strength from a base station in the active set is lower than
dropping threshold for a period of dropping threshold time. It is
removed from the active set and loses the connection to the user.
In WCDMA system, Soft handover decision algorithm is located at
RNC.
CPICH (common pilot channel) for quality measurements.
Measurement control and report
Soft handover (Intra-RNC)
Soft handover (Inter-RNC)
3G to 2G handover
Events