Cellular Network Generations

Home , Cellular network

Table of Contents

Introduction to Cellular Technology ...... 2

Objectives...... 3

Overview ...... 4

Cellular Network Generations – 1G -1 ...... 5

Cellular Network Generations – 1G -2 ...... 6

Cellular Network Generations – 2G -1 ...... 8

Cellular Network Generations – 2G -2 ...... 10

Cellular Network Generations – 3G -1 ...... 11

Cellular Network Generations – 3G -2 ...... 13

Cellular Network Generations – 4G -1 ...... 15

Cellular Network Generations – 4G -2 ...... 19

Notices ...... 21

Page 1 of 21 Introduction to Cellular Technology

Introduction to Cellular Technology

**001 So Introduction to Cellular Technology. Again, the fun notice. I'm going to skip it. It's in your slide handouts if you want to actually read it.

Page 2 of 21 Objectives

Objectives

At the completion of this module, students should be familiar with: • Generations of cellular technologies • Types and capabilities of cellular networks • Government standards related to cellular devices • Cellular device components

**003 So at the completion of this, you should be familiar with these items. What are the different generations of cellular technology? This mostly applies to the network side. What is 11G, what is 2G? What exactly- what capabilities does 4G have that the other generations do not have?

The types and capabilities of cellular networks. How does GSM differ from CDMA? How are they actually transmitting data? How do the cell towers actually work?

Government standards related to cellular devices. Most of the standards are going to be based on

Page 3 of 21 FCC regulations because they control the airwaves in the United States. There's other governing bodies that control the airspace in other countries. Some countries there is no control over the airspace. We're going to focus on the U.S. regulations.

And then the components that make up a cellular device.

Overview

Generations of Cellular Technologies • Evolution from 1st – 4th Generation • Mobile Devices Types and Capabilities of Wireless Networks • CMDA vs. TDMA • Bluetooth • IEEE 802.11 • US Government Security Standards

**004 The generations of cellular technologies. Evolution from 1st Generation to 4th Generation. What has happened with the devices? What features have been added along the way that weren't available in older generations?

Page 4 of 21 CDMA versus TDMA. These are the underlying technologies of the CDMA and GSM networks. Bluetooth, IEEE 802.11 or Wi-Fi, and the US Government Security Standards.

Cellular Network Generations – 1G -1

1st Generation (1G) • Introduced for public use ~ 1981 • 100% Analog — No Data!! • AMPS – Advanced Mobile Phone System

**005 So 1st Generation. First introduced for public use in 1981. A hundred percent analog; no data was available. The problem with it being analog was anyone with a frequency scanner could listen in on your conversations.

The problem with no data is you have nothing like SMS. You have MMS messages. You could only send phone calls. It actually used

Page 5 of 21 frequency modulation to send the signal. So since it's analog, it took up the entire signal, the entire frequency it was transmitting on. So there was very few users per cellular tower.

AMPS is the Advanced Mobile Phone System. That was introduced in 1978 in the United States. That is the United States version for allowing 1st generation communication. Very expensive; not secure; not widely used. Very expensive for somebody to use it.

Cellular Network Generations – 1G -2

Very Expensive – Not Secure • Not widely used • Mobile units available in cars

**006 Most often these were business people that were using 1st generation technology. Most people you

Page 6 of 21 wouldn't see having their own person phone. They're very big, they're very bulky; battery did not last a long time.

It shows mobile units available in cars. There was actually car units available in other countries much earlier than 1978 when AMPS was introduced. So the car technology is really what spawned the rest of the cellular technology: very big batteries; wasn't something you could carry around. But Sweden, Norway had a system with car phones I think as early as the '50s or '60s.

And so the cellular revolution then was just a shoot-off. As batteries became better, as these devices got- became smaller and didn't require as much power, that's when we started being able to see actual cellular devices not hooked up in a car.

Page 7 of 21 Cellular Network Generations – 2G -1

Cellular Network Generations – 2G -1

2nd Generation (2G and 2.5G) • Introduced ~ 1991 • 100% Digital • Availability of data — 10 ~ 144 Kbps transfer • Emergence of SMS (Simple Message Service), MMS (Multimedia Message Service), and mobile Internet • CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) vs. GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications)

**007 So 2nd Generation. The 2nd generation of networks was introduced in '91. A hundred percent digital. So now instead of being able to use a frequency scanner and listening in on all the calls located near me, there's- it's all digital. With digital, we started getting encryption.

We get very low data rates. We're talking about 10 Kbits/sec, up to 144 Kbits/sec. This is when we start seeing SMS and MMS messages available on cellular devices. That's about all you could do over-- you could do other stuff over 2G. But the

Page 8 of 21 data rate is so slow. I wouldn't want to do like a video call over 2G. It's just too slow.

We see the emergence of SMS, MMS and mobile Internet. You can finally keep up with your favorite fantasy football teams on your phone, if you really want to. It's just going to take 110 minutes to load Yahoo in order to see what your match ups for the week are.

This is also where we start seeing CDMA-- which is Code Division Multiple Access-- versus GSM networks; Global System for Mobile Communications.

We'll get into later in the block for the U.S. pretty equivalent number of users on the two systems. Worldwide that's not necessarily the case. GSM has many more users than CDMA because GSM was actually introduced in Europe.

So they created it. They started rolling it out to their countries and countries that they had relationships with; and the U.S. decided well Qualcomm's part of the U.S.; let's go ahead and introduce CDMA networks also.

Page 9 of 21 Cellular Network Generations – 2G -2

Cellular Network Generations – 2G -2

Competition • Market for cell phones grows exponentially • Network providers face off

**008 Market for cell phones grow exponentially. This is when you start seeing people walking around with personal cell phones; not just business use anymore. I can now use-- I want to keep in touch. I feel naked now if I don't have a cell phone on me. I want to be able to get my wife's email message or text message or voice call wherever I'm located.

Cell phones allow you to be connected. I travel a lot. The last two months I've been out of the country for basically a month of the time. So having the cellular device is one of the ways that I can keep in

Page 10 of 21 touch with the people back in San Antonio where I'm from. Without the cell phone, I would be gone for 18 days and might not have any type of communication if the place I was at didn't have wireless.

The network providers face off. Network providers at this point decided are we going to be a GSM network; are we going to be a CDMA network?

Cellular Network Generations – 3G -1

3rd Generation (3G) • Introduced ~ 2001 • Improved network speeds — 384 Kbps ~ 3 Mbps • GSM vs. CDMA2000

**009 3rd Generation. Introduced in 2001. The data rates increase exponentially. So instead of having 110 to 144 kilobits, we have 384 kilobits to up to 3 Mbits/sec. So the

Page 11 of 21 speeds are much, much faster. We can actually start doing stuff like using it as a replacement for your home internet service.

Three Mbits/sec is probably a speed you'll never see in the real world. That's like best-case scenario is 3 Mbits/sec on the network. Most users probably see no more than 11/2 Mbits/sec to 2 Mbits/sec. But it's still fast enough that when I'm out of the house-- or even if I'm in the house sitting on my couch-- instead of having to go to the computer to do something, I just do it on the cell phone instead; because it's good enough.

GSM versus CDMA2000. At this point we see a- we see the type of networks being used start to merge a little bit. So we'll get into what TDMA is, and how it works, and how CDMA works. But with GSM and CDMA2000, the CDMA networks start using some of the principles of TDMA, and the GSM networks start using some of the principles of CDMA. Because they had started running into issues with the way things were in the 2G world. So we start seeing a little bit of co-mingling between the type of technologies these phones are actually using.

Page 12 of 21 Cellular Network Generations – 3G -2

Cellular Network Generations – 3G -2

Smart Phones Emerge • Increased functionally • Smaller form factor

**010 Smart phones emerge. This doesn't mean there wasn't smart phones before 3G networks; because there were. Palm has had smart phone type devices out for a long time; '90s, PDAs. PDA is the precursor to the smart phone.

But with 3G, the data rates are now fast enough, the technology is now small enough, and the OS manufacturers are smart enough to be able- to start focusing their devices on the consumer level rather than on the business level.

So you start seeing people like my mother get smart phones. Before basically the 3rd generation, she

Page 13 of 21 would've been like, "Why do I need a smart phone? I don't need to be connected all the time. I don't need to do email when I'm not at the house." Now she probably couldn't live without her smart phone.

So we-- the OS manufacturers, especially Apple, were very, very smart. They were very direct in their focusing. They definitely focused on the consumer level at this point. And at this point cell phones have become ubiquitous. Everybody has a cell phone; at least everybody I know has a cell phone. I know 12-year-old kids that have a cell phone, because their parents want to be able to keep in touch with them, regardless of where they are.

Page 14 of 21 Cellular Network Generations – 4G -1

Cellular Network Generations – 4G -1

4th Generation (4G) • Still under development (as of January 2012) • Higher network capacity — 100% packet switched — IPv6 • Data transfer rates drastically increased — 100Mbps ~ 1Gbps • LTE (Long Term Evolution) Advanced • WiMAX (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access)

*011 And now we're seeing the 4th generation rolling out. 4G network, the first 4G network in the U.S. was Sprint in 2000-and-- two years ago-- 2008/2009-ish is when they started developing it. The first 4G phone was released in 2010; the Evo 4G.

Sprint used a different technology than the other phone companies in the U.S. to get the first 4G phones on the market. We'll discuss the difference between WiMAX and LTE later on.

It says "still under development". There's still work ongoing with the 4G standard. There are 4G networks out

Page 15 of 21 there-- LTE is an approved 4G network-- but they're still working on the standard and they're still working on what exactly is a 4G network and what's not going to be included as a 4G network.

Higher network capacity. The phones are now 100- the data sent is 1100% packet switched. IPv6 is available. So it's-- they're trying to future proof the technology. As we start moving to IPv6 instead of IPv4, the 4G standard has that capability built into it. So we're not going to have like a Y2K problem with cell phones because the technology is already built into 4G.

Data transfer rates greatly increase. This says 100 Mbits/sec to 1 Gbits/sec. Are you ever going to see 11 Gbits/sec? Probably not. Are you ever going to see 100 Mbits/sec? Probably not.

My understanding is the Verizons and AT&Ts, LTE, is somewhere between 20 and 40 Mbits/sec; depending on your contracts, depending on how close you are to a tower, and there being no interference between you and the cell phone tower. But that is exponentially greater than what was available in 3G; and even 20 Mbits/sec is faster than most users have at home.

I think my connection at home caps out at 12 Mbits/sec. Now we're talking about 20 Mbits/sec over the phone. If it wasn't for data caps, I would be very tempted to cut my

Page 16 of 21 home internet usage and just funnel everything over my phone's connection when I'm home.

Now Verizon's and AT&T's data caps preclude that from happening because they haven't raised the data caps in the 4G world. So we're still looking at 2 Gigabits caps, 5 Gigabit caps. With 4G, you can go through that very, very quickly.

LTE, Long Term Evolution, Advanced. That's the next step in the LTE roll out. That's when we're going to start seeing potentially 100 Mbits/sec. I still don't know if we're ever going to actually see those data rates on a network.

I'm going to make a statement-- it's going to be proven false in five years- - but I don't see a reason why we would need 100 Mbits/sec. Any streaming I do-- Netflix, Hulu; which is-- the video services are usually the highest bandwidth usage. If I VPN into my system, I'm not coming anywhere near even 20 Mbits/sec required.

Now if I was going to use my phone as a hot spot and service five to seven other phones, well then maybe I care about having speeds greater than 20 Mbits/sec. But even then, if I'm doing five devices over a 20 megabit device, that's still 4 megabits per device. So still faster than most people's home internet.

WiMAX; Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access. In the U.S. at least, we're moving away from

Page 17 of 21 WiMAX. There are some areas, some cities, that are trying to roll out WiMAX so that people in their city can have free coverage wherever they are.

Sprint was the big proponent for WiMAX in the United States. However, they've started to roll out an LTE network. I believe their phones come out either this summer or this fall, that are going to be LTE instead of WiMAX.

So at least in the U.S.-- and this isn't true worldwide but at least in the U.S.-- WiMAX is starting to go away. Because none of the major carriers are going to support WiMAX. And we'll get into the Why later on.

Page 18 of 21 Cellular Network Generations – 4G -2

Cellular Network Generations – 4G -2

Significant increase in mobile device functionality • Converges with traditional laptops  Ultrabooks • Seamless integration with existing wireless LANs (Local Area Networks)

**012 So 4G, we also see increases in the functionality of these mobile devices. So we start seeing more and more laptops that have cellular connections. I don't need a Wi-Fi signal near me. I can just attach to the 3G or the 4G network and use that, instead of having Wi-Fi.

Again the issue with that is AT&T, Verizon, you have data caps. Once you go over 2 Gigs or 5 Gigs or whatever your plan is capped for, you start paying on a per gig basis. So until those data caps, or unless those data caps get raised, you don't want to use your cellular connection too much.

Page 19 of 21 It's more advantageous for me to use a free Wi-Fi nearby-- even though there might be security risks with using then Wi-Fi-- than with going over the 3G because-- or 4G-- because the Wi-Fi's free. So maybe I just don't do some of the surfing or go do some of the VPN stuff I would normally do over Wi-Fi, I just do my regular surfing over the cellular. If I then-- or over the Wi-Fi. If I then need to do something more security related, I will then switch over to the cellular connection to do that more- those other items.

Seamless Integration with Existing Wireless LANs. So part of the future proofing is people are starting to roll out city-wide Wi-Fis. So if I'm in range of one of these Wi-Fis, my device may automatically connect to it, and then when I go out of range it will automatically switch to 3G. But the Wi-Fi is supposed to be over the entire city. So as I get close to a Wi- Fi hotspot, it will automatically connect. When I move away from it, it will automatically unconnect and start using the cellular connection instead. That's sort of in the what is coming down the road though.

Page 20 of 21 Notices

Notices

This material has been approved for public release and unlimited distribution except as restricted below. This material is distributed by the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) only to course attendees for their own individual study. Except for the U.S. government purposes described below, this material SHALL NOT be reproduced or used in any other manner without requesting formal permission from the Software Engineering Institute at [email protected].

This material is based upon work funded and supported by the Department of Defense under Contract No. FA8721-05-C-0003 with Carnegie Mellon University for the operation of the Software Engineering Institute, a federally funded research and development center. The U.S. Government's rights to use, modify, reproduce, release, perform, display, or disclose this material are restricted by the Rights in Technical Data-Noncommercial Items clauses (DFAR 252-227.7013 and DFAR 252-227.7013 Alternate I) contained in the above identified contract. Any reproduction of this material or portions thereof marked with this legend must also reproduce the disclaimers contained on this slide. Although the rights granted by contract do not require course attendance to use this material for U.S. Government purposes, the SEI recommends attendance to ensure proper understanding. NO WARRANTY. THE MATERIAL IS PROVIDED ON AN “AS IS” BASIS, AND CARNEGIE MELLON DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL WARRANTIES, IMPLIED OR OTHERWISE (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, WARRANTY OF FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, RESULTS OBTAINED FROM USE OF THE MATERIAL, MERCHANTABILITY, AND/OR NON-INFRINGEMENT). CERT® is a registered mark of Carnegie Mellon University. .

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