3GPP Mobile Communications: WCDMA and HSPA

This chapter provides a comprehensive overview on wireless communications according to the 3GPP technologies of Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA) and High Speed Packet Access (HSPA). These technologies are used in the Universal Mobile Telecommunication Standard (UMTS) belonging to the 3rd Generation (3G) of mobile cellular solutions. The radio network controller (RNC) is a part of the UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN) which controls and distributes radio resources that belong to its domain comprising of all NodeBs which are connected to it. To facilitate channel estimation, WCDMA employs reference signals in uplink and downlink, which are known to the receiver side and transmitted with a spreading factor of 256. Multiple‐Input Multiple Output (MIMO) is one of the key performance enhancement features in contemporary communication systems. MIMO essentially implies the use of multiple antennas at the transmitter and/or at the receiver side.