UMTS Analyzer

GL Communications Inc.
 
 
 
 


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umts Analysis

Overview

UMTS (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System) being an access network in the mobile communication area provides a common interface to both GSM and GPRS core network. UMTS is capable of handling both Circuit-Switched (CS) as well as Packet-Switched (PS) data simultaneously through its UTRAN network.

UMTS separates the user plane from control plane, radio network plane from the transport network plane, access network from the core network, and access stratum from the non-access stratum. Separation of transport network subsystem and radio network subsystem enables the UMTS to use multiple transport layer mechanism.

  
 
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User's Guide
 
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Sample Messages
 
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IP and ATM are the most preferred transport network layer protocol used in the UMTS. ATM based UMTS network is more popular since it ensures various QoS and Classes of Services to the end user.

UMTS recommends two types of transport layer option

  1. ATM based (provides different QOS and Classes of service)
  2. IP based

GL's UMTS analyzer is capable of capturing, decoding and performing various test measurements across various interfaces i.e. Iub, Iur, IuCs and IuPs interfaces of the UMTS network. In addition, it supports ATM as the transport layer. It helps in fault diagnosis and troubleshooting of UMTS network. Multiple instances of UMTS Analyzer can run simultaneously capturing data (real time and off-line) on several T1/E1 lines. The analyzer is also capable of capturing & reassembling frames that were transmitted with Inverse Multiplexing. IMA combines up to 8 T1/ E1 links to form a single high-speed connection with flexible bandwidth options.

GL Communications supports the following types of UMTS analyzers:

  • Real-time UMTS Analyzer (Pre-requisites: GL's field proven E1 or T1 internal cards or USB Laptop E1 or T1 external units, required licenses and Windows XP (or higher) Operating System)
  • Offline UMTS Analyzers(Pre-requisites: Hardware Dongles and Windows XP (or higher) Operating System)

Screen Shot of UMTS Analyzer Main Window

Main Features

  • Performs numerous measurements across Iub, Iur, IuCs and IuPs interfaces.
  • Displays Summary, Detail, Hex-dump, Statistics, and Call Trace Views, the contents of this view can also be copied to clipboard.
  • Summary View provides the information about few important fields (Dev #, Time Slot, VPI/VCI, PT, HEC, OSF, AAL type, CID, AAL type 2 signaling message (ALCAP message) etc and more in a tabular format.
  • Detail View displays decodes of a user-selected frame from the Summary View.
  • Statistics View displays statistics based on frame count, byte count, frames/sec, bytes/sec etc for the entire capture data.
  • Hex dump view displays raw frame data as hexadecimal and ASCII octet dump, the contents of this view can also be copied to clipboard.
  • Call Trace capability over IuCs and IuPs interfaces.
  • Search and filtering capabilities for both real-time as well as offline analysis.
  • Decodes different control plane protocols i.e. NBAP, RNSAP, RANAP, ALCAP, SSCOP etc and user plane protocols i.e. Iu-UP, Iu-FP, AMR etc.
  • Decode NAS protocols (i.e. CC/MM/SM/SMS/GMM) along with the UTRAN specific protocols.
  • User can configure VPI/VCI values for PVCs carrying NBAP, RNSAP, RANAP and ALCAP messages to enable decoding of the said protocols.
  • Ability to configure .ini file for VPI & VCI (for ALCAP, NBAP, RANAP, and so on).
  • CRC verification for AAL5 carrying packet data.
  • Capability to export summary view details to comma separated values (CSV) format for subsequent import into a database or spreadsheet.
  • Capability to export detail decode information to an ASCII.
  • Any protocol field can be added to the summary view, filtering, and search features providing users more flexibility to monitor required protocol fields.
  • Remote monitoring capability using GL's Network Surveillance System.

Additional features supported by real-time UMTS Analyzer

  • Supports real-time as well as offline analysis.
  • Recorded raw data can be played back using raw data playback application.
  • Captures, decodes, filters, and reassembles AAL-2 and AAL-5 frames from within the ATM cells according to user defined VPI/VCI.
  • Streams may be captured on the selected time slots (contiguous or non-contiguous) and on full bandwidth.
  • The following variations are accommodated in the software: inverted or non-inverted data, byte reversal or non-reversal, with or without inverse multiplexing in ATM (IMA).
  • Unscrambling of ATM cells based on SDH X^43 + 1 algorithm.
  • Multiple streams of UMTS traffic on various T1/E1 channels can be simultaneously decoded with different GUI instances.

Additional features supported by Offline UMTS Analyzer:

  • Trace files for analysis can be loaded through simple command-line arguments
  • Multiple trace files can be loaded simultaneously with different GUI instances for offline analysis

Protocols Supported

The list of protocols that are supported by GL's UMTS analyzer are as given below:



The supported protocol interfaces in UMTS analyzer are Iub-Interface, Iu-Cs/Iu-Ps-Interface, Iur-Interface.

Supported Protocols Specification Used
ATM ITU-T I.361
AAL ITU-T I.363
AAL2 Class B (ITU-T I.363.2)
AAL5 Class C & D (ITU-T I.363.5)
SSCOP ITU-T Q.2110
SSCF for UNI ITU-T Q.2130 (07/94)
AAL Type 2 (ALCAP) ITU-T Recommendation Q.2630.1
NBAP 3GPP TS 25.433 V6.3.0 (2004-09)
Iub FP GPP TS 25.427 V6.1.0 (2004-12) and 3GPP TS 25.435 V6.1.0(2004-03)
RANAP 3GPP TS 25.413 V6.3.0 (2004-09)
Iu-UP GPP TS 25.415 V6.1.0
MTP3-B ITU-T Recommendation Q.2210
RNSAP 3GPP TS 25.423 V6.4.0 (2004-12)
SCCP ITU ITU-T Q.711-Q.714
SCCP ANSI ANSI T1.112-1996
SCTP RFC 2960
IP RFC 791
UDP RFC 768
GMM (GPRS Mobility Managaement) 3GPP TS 04.08 V7.19.0
GSM CC 3GPP TS 04.08 V7.17.0
GSM MM 3GPP TS 04.08 V7.17.0
SMG (GPRS Session Management) 3GPP TS 04.08 V7.19.0
SMS 3GPP TS 03.40 V7.5.0 & 3GPP TS 04.11 V7.1.0 GSM 03.38 version 7.2.0
AMR 3GPP TS 26.101 V6.0.0
SSSAR ITU-T I.366.1
UMTS MAC RLC 3GPP TS 25.321 V6.1.0 and 3GPP TS 25.322 V6.1.0
RRC 3GPP TS 25.331 V6.4.0
M3UA RFC 3332

Click here to view the protocol glossary page for more information

Summary, Detail and Hex dump Views

The UMTS analyzer application is invoked from the main menu of GL's T1/E1 Analyzer for real-time analyzer. The offline UMTS analyzer is invoked from the installation directory of the offline UMTS Analyzer. The analyzer displays Summary, Detail and Hex dump views in different panes. The Summary View displays Frame Number, Time, Length, Error, VPI, VCI, PT, HEC, OSF, AAL Type, CID, LI, UUI, CPI and Frame Type message. User can select a frame in Summary View to analyze and decode each frame in the Detail View. The Hex dump View displays the frame information in HEX and ASCII format.

Screen Shot of Summary, Detail and Hex dump Views

Real time and Offline Analysis

Users can capture and analyze UMTS frames in real-time and record all or filtered traffic into a trace file.be used for offline analysis or exported to a comma-delimited file, or ASCII file. UMTS raw data capturing requires user to specify timeslots, bit inversion, octet bit reversion, user/network side, ATM mapping, scrambling, and inverse multiplexing (IMA) options. The captured raw data can then be transmitted using playback file application.

Screen Shot of Timeslot selection

Inverse Multiplexing in ATM (IMA) Feature

The UMTS Analyzer is enhanced to capture & reassemble frames that were transmitted with Inverse Multiplexing option. With Inverse Multiplexing in ATM (IMA) feature, up to 8 T1/E1 links can be configured to form a high-speed connection. ATM cells are transmitted across multiple interfaces in a cyclical fashion, and recombined to form the original stream.

Screen Shot of IMA Working Principle

Screen Shot of Captured ATM frames with IMA

Filtering and Search

Users can record all or filtered traffic into a trace file. Filter and search capabilities adds a powerful dimension to the UMTS Analyzer. These features isolate required frames from all frames in real-time, as well as offline. Users can specify custom VPI, VCI, and PT type values to filter frames during real-time capture. The frames can also be filtered after completion of capture based on Frame Number, Time, Length, Error, VPI, VCI, PT, HEC, OSF, AAL Type, CID, LI, UUI, and more. Similarly, Search capability helps user to search for a particular frame based on specific search criteria.

Screen Shot of Setting the Filtering Criteria

Screen Shot of Real-time Capture Filter

Reassembly

Using reassembly option user can specify VPI /VCI value to reassemble as per the Segmentation and Reassembly rules defined by the specified AAL type.

Screen Shot of Capture Filter and Reassembly

Call Detail Records & Statistics View

Important call specific parameters like Call ID, Call disposition, Call duration, Mobile ID, Called/Calling Number, Call type (SMS/PDP/Setup/Location update etc) are displayed for IuCs and IuPs interfaces in the Call Detail Records View.

Statistics is an important feature available in UMTS analyzer and can be obtained for all frames both in real-time as well as offline mode. Various statistics can be obtained in statistics view to study the performance and trend in the ATM network based on protocol fields and different parameters.

Screen Shot of Statistics and Call Detail Records View

Enhanced Trace Saving Options

Users can control the captured trace files by saving the trace using different conventions such as trace files with user-defined prefixes, trace file with date-time prefixes, and slider control to indicate the total number of files, file size, frame count, or time limit. This feature also allows the captured frames to be saved into a trace file based on the filtering criteria set using display filter feature.

Screen Shot of Enhanced Trace Saving Options Window

Save/Load All Configuration Settings

Protocol Configuration window provides a consolidated interface for all the important settings required in the analyzer. This includes various options such as protocol selection, startup options, stream/interface selection, filter/search criteria and so on. Any protocol field can be added to the summary view, filtering, and search features from this GUI providing the users more flexibility to monitor required protocol fields. All the configuration settings done in any of these options can be saved to a file, loaded from a configuration file, or user may just revert to the default values using the default option.

Screen Shot of Save/Load All Configuration Window

Screenshots

Screen Shot of NBAP (Node B Application Part)

Screen Shot of ALCAP

Bridge and Monitor Connections

Buyer's Guide:

Please Note: The XX in the Item No. refers to the hardware platform, listed at the bottom of the Buyer's Guide, which the software will be running on. Therefore, XX can either be HDT, HDE, HUT, HUE, UTA or UEA depending upon the hardware.

Item No. Item Description
XX165 T1 or E1 UMTS Protocol Analyzer
OLV165 Offline UMTS Protocol Analyzer
  Related Software
XX120 SS7 Analysis Software
XX150 GSM Protocol Analyzer
XX153 TRAU Protocol Analyzer
XX155 GPRS Protocol Analyzer
  Related Hardware
PTE001 tProbe™ Dual T1 E1 Laptop Analyzer with Basic Analyzer Software
HDT001/HDE001 Legacy HD T1 or E1 (PCI) Cards with Basic Analyzer Software
HTE001 Universal T1/E1 Card with Basic Analyzer Software
UTE001 Portable USB based Dual T1 or E1 Laptop Analyzer with Basic Analyzer Software

* Specifications and features subject to change without notice.

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