First Generation

Justin Champion
C208 Ext:3273

First Generation
What

we will look at

1st Generation technology

Analogue signals
Frequency Division
Handover
Infrastructure

First Generation

Early Wireless
communications

Signal fires
Morse Code
Radio
Radio Transmitter 1928 Dorchester

First Generation
1st

Generation devices

Introduced in the UK by Vodafone

January 1985

UK Technology (and Italy)

Total Access Cellular System (TACS)

This was based on the American design of AMPS

Used the 900MHz frequency range

Europe

Germany adopted C-net

France adopted Nordic Mobile Telephone (NMT)

First Generation

Operates

Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA)

Covered in next slide
Operates in the 900MHz frequency range
Three parts to the communications

Voice channels
Paging Channels
Control Channels

PCS 1G to 2G technology

FDMA

Breaks up the available frequency into 30 KHz channels

Allocates a single channel to each phone call
The channel is agreed with the Base station before
transmission takes place on agreed and reserved channel
The device can then transmit on this channel

No other device can share this channel even if the person is not
talking at the time!
A different channel is required to receive

The

voice/sound is transmitted as analogue data, which means

that a large than required channel has to be allocated.

PCS 1G to 2G technology

FDMA
Frequency

PCS 1G to 2G technology

FDMA

You use this technology all of the time!

Consider your radio in the house
As you want different information you change the frequency
which you are receiving

PCS 1G to 2G technology

Voice calls

Are transferred using Frequency modulation

The rate at which the carrier wave undulates is changed
Encoding information
More resistant to interference than AM radio

(www.tiscali.co.uk/reference/encyclopaedia/hutchinson/m0030280.html, 2004)

PCS 1G to 2G technology

1G infrastructure

PSTN

Mobile Switching Centre

First Generation
Infrastructure

Base Station

Carries out the actual radio communications with the

device
Sends out paging and control signals

MSC

Takes responsibility

Controls all calls attached to this device

Maintains billing information
Switches calls (Handover)

First Generation
Cellular

Architecture

Allows the area to be broken into smaller cells

The mobile device then connects to the closest
cell
Cell
Cell
Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

Cell

Cell

First Generation

Cellular Architecture continued

Cellular architecture requires the available frequency to be

distributed between the cells
If 2 cells next to each other used the same frequency each
would interfere with each other

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

Cell

Frequency 900

First Generation

Cellular Architecture continued

There must be a distance between adjoining cells

This distance allows communications to take place

Cell

Frequency 900

Cell

Frequency 920

Cell

Frequency 940

Cell

Frequency 960

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

First Generation

Cellular Architecture continued

This is referred to as the Minimum Frequency Reuse Factor

This requires proper planning and can be an issue for all radio
based wireless communications
Planning the radio cell and how far a signal may go

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

First Generation

Radio Planning

Logically we picture a cell as being a

Octagon
In reality the shape of a transmission will
change depending on the environment
In this diagram of a cell you can see this

The building are the rectangles in dark green

The darker the shade of green the stronger
the signal
Cell

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

First Generation

Radio Planning

Planning needs careful thought

You must cover the entire area with the minimum of base
stations
Base stations cost the company money
They also make the potential for radio problems greater
Simulations can be used but accurate models of the area is
required
Best solution is to measure the signals at various points

From this a decision can be made

Cell
Cell

Cell
Cell

First Generation
Cellular

Cells with different frequencies allow devices to

move between these cells

infrastructure why ??

The device just informing what frequency they are

communicating at

Cellular communications can only travel a certain

distance

Discussed in the wireless LANs lecture

Cell sizes are flexible

Examples in the TUK TACS system were up to 50 Miles!

First Generation
Cellular

infrastructure

Once you get to the edge of a cell you will need

a handover

Handover allows the user to move between cells

After a certain distance the amount of data which is sent in

error becomes greater than the data sent correctly at this
point you need to connect to a new cell which is closer.
TACS carries this out by monitoring the amplitude of the
voice signal

First Generation

Cellular infrastructure

Communicating with BS1

Moving towards BS2

Tra
nsm
issi
on

BS2

1
BS
n
sio
s
i
nsm
a
r
T
BS
2

BS1

First Generation

Cellular infrastructure

BS2

Power of signal now weakening

BS1

First Generation

Cellular infrastructure

BS2

Paging signal stronger so hand over to new MSC

BS1

First Generation
Handover

Once a handover is decided upon by the BS

The MSC is informed

All BS in the area of the current location are informed to start

paging the device
The BS with the strongest signal is then handed over to
The call can continue
In reality a lot of calls were dropped whilst waiting for a
handover to take place

Ending a call

A 8Khz tone is sent for 1.8 seconds

The phone then returns to an idle state

First Generation

TACS

Problems
Roaming was not applicable outside of the UK

Security

All of Europe was using different standards

Different frequencies
Different frequency spacing
Different encoding technologies
Calls were easily listened upon
Limited capacity of the available spectrum
Analogue signal meant a larger than required amount of the frequency
had to be allocated to each call
Expansion of the network was difficult

This was unacceptable

GSM was introduced

Next weeks lecture!

First Generation
Summary

1G systems

TACS

Frequency Use
Infrastructure
Handover
Problems