LTE RAN Utilization : How to measure ?

[fahmi]

Dear LTE experts,

Trying to evaluate my network RAN capacity and how well it's utilized, I wonder what will be the best practice to trigger a LTE capacity extension ?

To some point, a higher LTE PRB load does not always mean a capacity outage since few number of UE may cause PRB Overload and it is directly related to Traffic type and user behavior.

From your experience, what will be the best combination to trigger LTE capacity extension (PRB, UE, OSS Throughput ...)?



Thanks :)

[plannerguy]

Hi

RRC users and payload could be good indicator.

In nokia you can get precise capacity based on overload indicators - refer LTE056.

Rgds
Plannerguy

[longtermevolution]

Some additional check:
User Capacity Usage
PDCCH Resource Usage
Paging Resource Usage

Normally expansion triggered when :
example:
User Perceived Throughput <2Mbps and PRB utilization>80%

[jan74]

You need to check the counters already mentioned. Its also worthwhile checking the Minimum no of used PRBs on a low granularity(eg. 15 minute counters), No of users with data in buffer, delay in the scheduler etc. There is no magic counter/KPI that will tell you so you need to build up a picture of what is happening.

[oswe]

users vs avg user dl Throughput is a good indicator.
like you said sometimes you get high prb and low throughput...
u must also observe mean CQI we found usefull that as well.
we also observed UL interference influenced on throughput as well...
and besides all commented by other guys... if you have TX issue (bootleneck) you wont always be certain hehehe! sometimes a tx bootleneck is far away your site and low throughput wont be noticed (that is a pain as tx guys wont accept they have bootlenecks) cheers

[Zaid Almajali]

how we can check for the Tx bottleneck when we are aiming to measure over all capacity or cell capability.

[oswe]

how we can check for the Tx bottleneck when we are aiming to measure over all capacity or cell capability.

well, assuming your erab success rate is 100% (no mme failures in huawei and no rip or rnl failures in nokia )... try to plot users vs throughput observing good CQI hours and that should give you a very rough estimate. comparing that graph with a normal site

[croleg]

Anyone have a tool for capacity management like a E capacity?

[adriansyah]

PRB also include CCE Usage, RRC Conn UE and take some reference to Transport (Eth or IP)