Control channel
Location Area Identity (LAI).
List of neighboring cells that should be monitored
by the MS.
List of frequencies used in the cell.
Cell identity.
Power control indicator.
DTX permitted.
Access control (i.e., emergency calls, call barring ...
etc.).
CBCH description.
The BCCH is transmitted at constant power at all times,
and all MS that may seek to use it to measure its signal
strength. Dummy bursts are transmitted to ensure continuity when there is no BCCH carrier trac.
b. Frequency Correction Channel (FCCH): This is transmitted frequently on the BCCH timeslot and allows the
mobile to synchronize its own frequency to that of the
In radio communication, a control channel is a central
transmitting base site. The FCCH may only be sent durchannel that controls other constituent radios by handling
ing timeslot 0 on the BCCH carrier frequency and theredata streams. It is most often used in the context of a
fore it acts as a ag to the mobile to identify Timeslot 0.
trunked radio system, where the control channel sends
c. Synchronization Channel (SCH) The SCH carries
data which coordinates users in talkgroups.
the information to enable the MS to synchronize to the
In GSM networks, Control Channels can be broadly
TDMA frame structure and know the timing of the indidivided into 3 categories; Broadcast Control Channel
vidual timeslots. The following parameters are sent:
(BCCH), Common Control Channel (CCCH), and Dedicated Control Channels (DCCH).
Frame number.
Base Site Identity Code (BSIC).
Broadcast Control Channel
The MS will monitor BCCH information from surrounding cells and store the information from the best six cells.
The Broadcast Control Channel is transmitted by the base The SCH information on these cells is also stored so that
transceiver station (BTS) at all times. The RF carrier used the MS may quickly resynchronize when it enters a new
to transmit the BCCH is referred to as the BCCH carrier. cell.
The MS monitors the information carried on the BCCH
periodically (at least every 30 secs), when it is switched
on and not in a call.
2 Common Control Channels
The BCCH Consists of:
a. Broadcast Control Channel (BCCH): Carries the fol- The Common Control Channel (CCCH) is responsible
for transferring control information between all mobiles
lowing information:
1
REFERENCES
and the BTS. This is necessary for the implementation of 4 Channel Combination
call origination and call paging functions. It consists
of the following:
The dierent logical channel types mentioned are
a. Random Access Channel (RACH) Used by the mobile grouped into what are called channel combination. The
when it requires gaining access to the system. This occurs four most common channel combination are listed below:
when the mobile initiates a call or responds to a page.
1.
Full Rate Trac Channel Combination
b. Paging Channel (PCH) Used by the BTS to page MS, TCH8/FACCH + SACCH
(paging can be performed by an IMSI, TMSI or IMEI). 2. Broadcast Channel Combination BCCH + CCCH
c. Access Grant Control Channel (AGCH) Used by the 3. Dedicated Channel Combination SDCCH8 +
BTS to assign a dedicated control channel to a MS in re- SACCH8
sponse to an access message received on the Random AcCombined Channel Combination
cess Channel. The MS will move to the dedicated channel 4.
BCCH+CCCH+SDCCH4+SACCH4
in order to proceed with either a call setup, response to a
paging message, Location Area Update or Short Message 5.
Half Rate Trac Channel Combination
Service.
TCH16/FACCH + SACCH
d. Cell Broadcast Channel (CBCH) This channel is used The Half Rate Channel Combination (when introduced)
to transmit messages to be broadcast to all MSs within a will be very similar to the Full Rate Trac Combination.
cell. The CBCH uses a dedicated control channel to send
its messages, however it is considered a common channel
because all mobiles in the cell can receive the messages. 5 See also
Active MSs must frequently monitor both BCCH and
CCCH. The CCCH will be transmitted on the RF carrier with the BCCH.
Dedicated Control Channels
The DCCH is a single timeslot on an RF carrier that
is used to convey eight Stand-alone Dedicated Control
Channels (SDCCH). A single MS for call setup, authentication, location updating and SMS point to point use a
SDCCH. As we will see later, SDCCH can also be found
on a BCCH/CCCH timeslot, this conguration only allows four SDCCHs.
a. Slow Associated Control Channel (SACCH) Conveys
power control and timing information in the downlink direction (towards the MS) and Receive Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI), and link quality reports in the uplink direction.
b. Fast Associated Control Channel (FACCH) The
FACCH is transmitted instead of a TCH. The FACCH
steals the TCH burst and inserts its own information.
The FACCH is used to carry out user authentication, handovers and immediate assignment.
All of the control channels are required for system operation, however, in the same way that we allow dierent
users to share the radio channel by using dierent timeslots to carry the conversation data, the control channels
share timeslots on the radio channel at dierent times.
This allows ecient passing of control information without wasting capacity that could be used for call trac.
To do this we must organize the timeslots between those,
which will be used for trac, and those, which will carry
control signaling.
Control Channel Only
Trunked radio system
6 References
Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses
7.1
Text
Control channel Source: [Link] Contributors: Bearcat, Liotier, Pascal666,
Zeppelin4life, SmackBot, Gilliam, Flyer22 Reborn, Tyler, Jonverve, Dthomsen8, Atethnekos, EsotericWisp, ClueBot NG, 069952497a,
Soage and Anonymous: 12
7.2
Images
File:[Link] Source: [Link] License: CC BY 3.0 Contributors: Own
work Original artist: Kguirnela
File:Question_book-[Link] Source: [Link] License: Cc-by-sa-3.0
Contributors:
Created from scratch in Adobe Illustrator. Based on Image:Question [Link] created by User:Equazcion Original artist:
Tkgd2007
7.3
Content license
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0