Capacityi in LTE

A commonly accepted definition of capacity is the one provided by Shannon which states that
capacity is the maximum achievable set of rates in multiple access channels with an arbitrarily
small probability of error. As this metric represents a bound in performance, in practice, the
sum of the transmitted data rates (downlink) or aggregated data rate is used.
However, with the increased availability of new services in wireless networks, user perceived
quality or QoS is now also included in many capacity measures. For instance, voice services have
long been designed with a probability of error (non connection) ranging from 1% to 3% In the
data centric world, the system capacity could be defined as the maximum aggregated data rate
subject to the constraint that the average experienced quality of all flows in the system should be
fulfilled according to a given target.
As average experienced quality we can mention the average delay of all transmitted packets
or the average packet throughput. Since the required average experience varies across
different services, the traffic mix chosen by the Operators will have a strong influence on the
final maximum aggregate data rate that will be required and smart phone will further
complicated the situation with their new user behavior pattern.

The aim of LTE capacity dimensioning is to obtain the PS throughput supported in the network
based on the bandwidth available and channel condition of each user. A high level summary for
capacity planning process and input requirement is listed in the diagram.
Examples of Scenario Parameters and Equipment Parameters are also seen in figure.

Most of these parameters are similar to those used for 2G/3G network dimensioning and by
carefully considering the contribution of all these parameters, network planning engineers can
determine which customer service level can be met.
Nevertheless, the arrival of smart phone, which has completely different behavior compared to
feature phones, is going to add a new level of challenges to planning engineers. They frequently
changes state between idle and connected, its fast dormancy feature forces the terminal to
switch to an idle state every six to eight seconds in order to save battery power, and the service
heartbeat mechanism periodically communicates with the application server. According to
signaling statistics of operator, one smart phone creates 14 times the signaling load of a feature
phone.
In addition, the increasing popular level of applications like twitter will hasten the evolution of
customer behavior and traffic model in the next few years. Average subscriber usage at busy
hour has rapidly increased from the low 10kbps (since R99/1xRTT) to be in the mid to high
30kbps right now.