Universal Mobile Telecommunications System

The Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is a third generation mobile cellular system for networks based on the GSM standard. Developed and maintained by the 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project), UMTS is a component of the International Telecommunications Union IMT-2000 standard set and compares with the CDMA2000 standard set for networks based on the competing cdmaOne technology. UMTS uses wideband code division multiple access (W-CDMA) radio access technology to offer greater spectral efficiency and bandwidth to mobile network operators.

UMTS specifies a complete network system, which includes the radio access network (UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network, or UTRAN), the core network (Mobile Application Part, or MAP) and the authentication of users via SIM (subscriber identity module) cards.

The technology described in UMTS is sometimes also referred to as Freedom of Mobile Multimedia Access (FOMA) or 3GSM.

Unlike EDGE (IMT Single-Carrier, based on GSM) and CDMA2000 (IMT Multi-Carrier), UMTS requires new base stations and new frequency allocations.

Code division multiple access

Code division multiple access (CDMA) is a channel access method used by various radio communication technologies.

CDMA is an example of multiple access, where several transmitters can send information simultaneously over a single communication channel. This allows several users to share a band of frequencies (see bandwidth). To permit this without undue interference between the users, CDMA employs spread-spectrum technology and a special coding scheme (where each transmitter is assigned a code).

CDMA is used as the access method in many mobile phone standards such as cdmaOne, CDMA2000 (the 3G evolution of cdmaOne), and WCDMA (the 3G standard used by GSM carriers), which are often referred to as simply CDMA.

History

IS-95

Interim Standard 95 (IS-95) was the first ever CDMA-based digital cellular technology. It was developed by Qualcomm and later adopted as a standard by the Telecommunications Industry Association in TIA/EIA/IS-95 release published in 1995. The proprietary name for IS-95 is cdmaOne.

It is a 2G mobile telecommunications standard that uses CDMA, a multiple access scheme for digital radio, to send voice, data and signaling data (such as a dialed telephone number) between mobile telephones and cell sites.

CDMA or "code division multiple access" is a digital radio system that transmits streams of bits (PN codes). CDMA permits several radios to share the same frequencies. Unlike TDMA "time division multiple access", a competing system used in 2G GSM, all radios can be active all the time, because network capacity does not directly limit the number of active radios. Since larger numbers of phones can be served by smaller numbers of cell-sites, CDMA-based standards have a significant economic advantage over TDMA-based standards, or the oldest cellular standards that used frequency-division multiplexing.

CDMA2000

CDMA2000 (also known as C2K or IMT Multi‑Carrier (IMT‑MC)) is a family of 3G mobile technology standards for sending voice, data, and signaling data between mobile phones and cell sites. It is developed by 3GPP2 as a backwards-compatible successor to second-generation cdmaOne (IS-95) set of standards and used especially in North America and South Korea.

CDMA2000 compares to UMTS, a competing set of 3G standards, which is developed by 3GPP and used in Europe, Japan, and China.

The name CDMA2000 denotes a family of standards that represent the successive, evolutionary stages of the underlying technology. These are:

All are approved radio interfaces for the ITU's IMT-2000. In the United States, CDMA2000 is a registered trademark of the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA-USA).

1X

CDMA2000 1X (IS-2000), also known as 1x and 1xRTT, is the core CDMA2000 wireless air interface standard. The designation "1x", meaning 1 times Radio Transmission Technology, indicates the same radio frequency (RF) bandwidth as IS-95: a duplex pair of 1.25 MHz radio channels. 1xRTT almost doubles the capacity of IS-95 by adding 64 more traffic channels to the forward link, orthogonal to (in quadrature with) the original set of 64. The 1X standard supports packet data speeds of up to 153 kbit/s with real world data transmission averaging 80–100 kbit/s in most commercial applications. IMT-2000 also made changes to the data link layer for greater use of data services, including medium and link access control protocols and QoS. The IS-95 data link layer only provided "best efforts delivery" for data and circuit switched channel for voice (i.e., a voice frame once every 20 ms).

LTE (telecommunication)

LTE (Long-Term Evolution, commonly marketed as 4G LTE) is a standard for wireless communication of high-speed data for mobile phones and data terminals. It is based on the GSM/EDGE and UMTS/HSPA network technologies, increasing the capacity and speed using a different radio interface together with core network improvements. The standard is developed by the 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project) and is specified in its Release 8 document series, with minor enhancements described in Release 9.

LTE is the natural upgrade path for carriers with both GSM/UMTS networks and CDMA2000 networks. The different LTE frequencies and bands used in different countries will mean that only multi-band phones will be able to use LTE in all countries where it is supported.

Although marketed as a 4G wireless service, LTE (as specified in the 3GPP Release 8 and 9 document series) does not satisfy the technical requirements the 3GPP consortium has adopted for its new LTE Advanced standard. The requirements were originally set forth by the ITU-R organization in its IMT Advanced specification. However, due to marketing pressures and the significant advancements that WiMAX, Evolved HSPA and LTE bring to the original 3G technologies, ITU later decided that LTE together with the aforementioned technologies can be called 4G technologies. The LTE Advanced standard formally satisfies the ITU-R requirements to be considered IMT-Advanced. To differentiate LTE Advanced and WiMAX-Advanced from current 4G technologies, ITU has defined them as "True 4G".

UMTS frequency bands

The UMTS frequency bands are radio frequencies used by third generation (3G) wireless Universal Mobile Telecommunications System networks. They were allocated by delegate to the World Administrative Radio Conference (WARC-92) held in Málaga-Torremolinos, Spain between February 3, 1992 and March 3, 1992. Resolution 212 (Rev.WRC-97), adopted at the World Radiocommunication Conference held in Geneva, Switzerland in 1997, endorsed the bands specifically for the International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 (IMT-2000) specification by referring to S5.388, which states "The bands 1,885-2,025 MHz and 2,110-2,200 MHz are intended for use, on a worldwide basis, by administrations wishing to implement International Mobile Telecommunications 2000 (IMT-2000). Such use does not preclude the use of these bands by other services to which they are allocated. The bands should be made available for IMT-2000 in accordance with Resolution 212 (Rev. WRC-97)." To accommodate the reality that these initially defined bands were already in use in various regions of the world, the initial allocation has been amended multiple times to include other radio frequency bands.