Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS)

Kumarasamy Kirivarnan Faculty of Information Technology University of Moratuwa kirivarnan@gmail.com

Abstract- Third generation (3G) mobile communication

system, namely Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS), will support a wide range of applications with different quality of service (QoS) profiles. This paper provides an overview of the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS). UMTS allow very high-speed multimedia services such videoconferencing, full motion video, and Internet access and builds on the capability of todays mobile technologies by providing increased capacity, data capability. However, UMTS performance may not be sufficient to meet needs of future high-performance applications like multimedia, full-motion video, wireless teleconferencing. We need a network technology that extends UMTS capacity by an order of magnitude.

2. Overview of UMTS
The Universal Mobile Telecommunication Systems (UMTS) which, is part of the ITUs (International Telecommunication Union) International Mobile Telephone Standard 2000 (IMT2000) vision of a global family of 3Gmobile communications systems, has finally arrived [2]. A UMTS network consist of three interacting domains; Core Network (CN), UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN) and User Equipment (UE) [fig 1]. Differentiated Service (DS)-based transport IP services can be provided between the GGSN and the 3G-SGSN in the UMTS core network [2]. DS provide network layer service differentiation in IP networks. UMTS Release 6 with the legacy Circuit Switched (CS) Networks, such as Public Switch Telephone Network (PS) / Integrated Service Digital Network (ISDN) and GSM [4].UMTS combines the W-CDMA, TD-CDMA, or TD-SCDMA air interfaces, GSM's Mobile Application Part (MAP) core, and the GSM family of speech codes [2]. UMTS-TDD (Time Division Duplex) Radio Interface is towards a direct interconnection with IPv6 [1, 2]. UMTS-TDD implement the IPv6-based radio resource management for heterogeneous multiple radio-access technology wireless networks, smart-antenna technology, resource allocation and scheduling and Quality of Service management (QoS). UMTS network services have different QoS classes for four types of traffic: Conversational class (voice, video), Streaming class (multimedia, web cast), Interactive class (web browsing, database access), Background class (email, downloading) [2].UMTS has been designed for services to be maintained when the user moves from UMTS to GSM/GPRS/EDGE [1]. Radio mobility is allowed to dual-mode terminal may move seamlessly between the UMTS and GSM networks. Most UMTS terminals are in fact dual mode GSM/UMTS devices capable of operating in three or more frequency bands. UMTS security design was to improve on the security of GSM [3]. These improvements can take through the correcting real and perceived weaknesses. UTMS performance may not be sufficient to meet needs of future high-performance applications like multi-media, full-motion video, wireless teleconferencing. We need an improved network technology that extends UMTS capacity. There are multiple standards for UMTS making it difficult to roam. So, we need global mobility and service portability. UMTS is based on primarily a wide-area concept. We need hybrid networks that utilize both wireless LAN concept and base-station wide area network design & wider bandwidth. We need all digital packet networks that based on IP with converged voice and data capability.

1. Introduction
When technology is rapidly developing there is always issue about mobile communication performance. Todays, cellular phone & CDMA communication is an important communication networks in today world. These types of mobile communication networks are based on UTMS technology. Therefore UMTS is an important topic. The Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is one of the new third generation (3G) mobile communication systems being developed within the framework defined by the ITU known as IMT-2000[2]. Through the research, 3GPP is introducing UMTS in phases and annual releases. The first release (UMTS Rel. 99), introduced in December of 1999, and defines enhancements and transitions for existing GSM networks. The second phase (UMTS Rel. 00), defines enhancements and transitions for IS95 (with CDMA2000) and TDMA (with TDCDMA and EDGE) [2]. The technology is optimized to allow state of the art, very highspeed multimedia services such videoconferencing, full motion video, and Internet access [2]. UMTS builds on the capability of todays mobile technologies by providing increased capacity, data capability and greater range of services using a new radio interface standard called UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access (UTRA) and also 3G broadband, packet-based transmission of text [2, 5]. In the next sections describe very broad overview of the UMTS. That section includes UMTS Capabilities, UMTS Architecture, Data Throughput and UMTS Security features Latency and UMTS Application.

2.1 UMTS Capabilities

UMTS features the support of several leading telecommunications operators and manufacturers. UMTS has attempted to create an opportunity to build a market for highly customized and user-friendly mobile access to the world. The purpose of UMTS is to create and extend the capability of todays mobile and other satellite technologies. This is achieved by using a new radio access scheme and evolving core network [1]. UMTS exist with the GSM/GPRS/EDGE. But users can enjoy high data rates multimedia capabilities compare with GPRS and EDGE networks. Specifically, the network and associated services users can get the following advantages: Attractive new phones with large color displays Simultaneous voice and data operation Operation over both UMTS and GSM/GPRS networks Voice handover from UMTS to GSM High speed data services with peak rates of up to 384 kbps and typical average throughput rates of 220 to 320 kbps Network latency that is lower than that of GPRS/EDGE A UMTS modem card for data-intensive applications Practical use of laptop computers for generalpurpose communications Java support on phones & other wireless devices Multiple tethering options for phones including Bluetooth, IR and USB cable New utility-Wireless Communication Manager that configures and manages connections and provides connection status for GPRS/EDGE/ UMTS An optimization client for streamlining POP3 mail and HTTP Web sessions Compatibility with major Virtual Private Network (VPN) products

2.3 UMTS Architecture

Figure 1: UMTS Architecture

UMTS uses the same fundamental architecture for voice and data services as GSM/GPRS/EDGE. UMTS is divided into the 2 Networks (fig 1). They are, UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN) and the UMTS core network [1]. UMTS system uses the same core network as the GPRS and uses entirely new radio interface. The UTRAN is connected to the core network (CN) of GPRS via Iu interface. The Iu is the UTRAN interface between the Radio network controller RNC and CN [1]. The mobile terminal in UMTS is called User Equipment (UE). The UE is connected to Node-B over high speed Uu (up to 2 Mbps) interface (fig1). The Node-B is the equivalent of BTS in GSM and typically serves a cell site. Several Node-Bs are controlled by a single RNCs over the Iub interface. The RNCs are connected to CN through Iu interface (fig 1). The packet switched data is transmitted through Iu-PS interface and circuit switched data is transferred over Iu-CS interface. One of the new interfaces in UTRAN is Iur interface which connects two RNCs and has no equivalent in GSM system (fig1). The Iur interface facilitates handling of 100 percent of RRM (Radio Resource Management) and eliminates the burden from CN. Operators can use the same core network (consisting of the mobile switching centers and packet data nodes) for both the GSM/GPRS/EDGE radio access network and the UTRAN. Wireless is using the same mobile switching centers for both GSM and UMTS, but separate packet data infrastructure. This separate packet data infrastructure includes the Serving GPRS Support Node and Gateway GPRS Support Node.

2.2 UMTS Data Capabilities

We can use the same GPRS/EDGE applications as with UMTS such as, including e-mail, group collaboration, instant messaging, and SMS. But with UMTS throughput rates are higher and also can transfer larger files. In addition, with UMTS the following types of applications may be use: E-mail with large attachments General-purpose Web browsing Virtual private networking Complex database transactions Multimedia (video/audio streaming and downloading) Picture and video messaging WAP-based applications with rich content Intranet access to enterprise applications Web-based enterprise applications including enterprise resource planning, customer relationship management, and sales force automation

2.4 UMTS with IP Networking

Like GPRS/EDGE, the UMTS network relays IP packets between mobile stations and external networks [1]. Mobile stations are assigned an IP address when they invoke a data session that is called a Packet Data Protocol (PDP) Context. The mobile station can transmit IP packets to external networks and receive IP packets from external networks. A variety of other protocols are employed to carry IP packets through the UMTS infrastructure. These relay the IP packets to the GPRS Support Node (GGSN), a routing node. UMTS network currently supports communications via the Internet only. In UMTS Wireless Connectivity Option (WCO) is not available, because neither frame relay permanent virtual circuits nor the Network VPN. VPNs are using to make secure communications and also high data throughput capabilities of UMTS [1], [3]. UMTS uses the same approach to IP packet handling and Access Point Names (APNs) as GPRS/EDGE. The APN defines the type of IP address to use, security mechanisms to invoke, available value added services, redundancy, and fixed-end connections.

security-related data that the subscriber needs to make or receive a call. Subscriber authentication: the serving network corroborates the identity of the subscriber. Network authentication: the subscriber corroborates that he is connected to a serving network that is authorized by the subscribers home network. Encryption of data communications between the mobile station and the SGSN. GSM the cipher key is transported as a 64 bit structure. That is top 10 bits of the cipher key are set to zero to reduce the effective key length to 54 bits. GSM key is much more complex .UMTS required a new ciphering mechanism. UMTS use UMTS Encryption Algorithm1 (UEA1) [4], which is based on a mode of operation of a block cipher called Kasumi. This algorithm employs a 128 bit key. Protection of the UMTS network infrastructure against intruders through use of private networks and firewalls. Compatibility with VPN technology. So customers can secure data sessions on an end-to-end basis. Optional Personal Identification Number (PIN) protection of the user device. In order to achieve efficient and secure roaming between the different networks, UMTS security supports mechanisms with additional features, as compared the previous mobile systems (GSM, DECT).The encryption algorithms are stronger. UMTS specifications define enhanced security architecture, including mutual authentication of mobile station and network.

2.5 Data Throughput and Latency

UMTS network offers data throughput speeds higher than any previous network. UMTS data throughput speed is twice of EDGE data throughput speeds, more than five times higher than GPRS, and some twenty-five times higher than CDPD. Current devices are designed for peak speeds of 384 kbps. User can expect average speeds of 220 to 320 200 to 300 kbps for downloads. In comparison, GPRS users can expect 30 to 40 kbps (from a four time-slot device) and EDGE users can expect 100 to 130 kbps (from a four time-slot device). UMTS users can expect data upload rates of approximately 64 kbps [1]. UMTS Release Five has some additional features [1]. That includes High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA). HSDPA will offer peak downlink speeds as high as 14 Mbps. This is faster than any other cellular technology. Average speeds are expected to be about four times higher than WCDMA at about 1 Mbps. UMTS provide higher data rates, it also has lower latency (the time it takes packets to traverse the network). For some applications, latency is very important such as time sensitive applications. Time sensitive applications include interactive and streaming multimedia, Web browsing of complex pages with multiple objects, and database transactions. The latency of UMTS is measured by round trip time. Round trip time is measuring from the mobile station to a node immediately external to the UMTS network. This trip time is expected to be 200 to 250 ms. but GPRS/EDGE latency is about 600 ms.

2.7 Performance Evaluation of TCP over UMTS Transport

The most popular and widely used Internet applications are File Transfer Protocol (FTP), Hypertext Transfer protocol (HTTP), email, etc. These Internet applications rely on two common protocols, TCP and TCP/IP [1]. IP is concerned with routing data from source to destination host through one or more networks. TCP provides a reliable end-to-end data transfer service. Wireless communication uses many of the protocols designed for wired links, e.g. TCP. However, TCP could not perform efficiently in wireless environments because TCP over UMTS has a much high bit error rate [1, 3]. Different wireless technologies have different characteristics. But a few properties are common. So, they will have an impact on TCPs performance. High bit error rate is maybe limiting the utilization of the link and also it can cause all communication to fail. The TCP over UMTS performance depend on end-to-end packet delay, delay in Radio Access Network and throughput in wireless link [1]. TCP over UMTS performs well in lower data rates, i.e. 64 and 144 kbps. But in higher data rates, its performance is significantly reduced. TCP mechanisms do not efficiently use the guaranteed QoS of the UMTS radio bearers in terms of delay and throughput. The TCP over UMTS performance can increase through using the load control mechanisms on TCP [3].this load control mechanism on TCP very broad explanation in section 4.

2.6 Security
The UMTS security mechanisms are similar to those used in the GPRS/EDGE network and new mechanisms also introduced [2, 4].These mechanisms include: Entity authentication UMTS provides mutual authentication between the UMTS subscriber, which is USIM (Universal Subscriber Identity Module). The SIM contains all the identification and

3.Implication of UMTS on Digital Broadcasting and Newsgathering

A third generation Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS) will offer between 144kb/s and 2Mb/s data rates [2, 5]. That is depend on the user location and demand for services. Major application of UMTS will be the delivery of multimedia in higher data rate. Beyond UMTS new high data rate services offer high quality live video news interviews, broadcasting, communications and computing merging. Bluetooth, Broadband Radio Access Networks (BRAN) and HiPerLan are new high data rate services to beyond UMTS [5]. UMTSs incorporation of connectionless services provides significant benefits in terms of efficiency. If we take sending an email, UMTS has channel utilization efficiency 1 of 90% compared to 19% for GSM because of the overhead in the dial up times / connection times. For another application such as a computer game application, assuming intelligent terminals, the efficiency for UMTS is stated as 14% while for 9.6kb/s GSM it is only 0.1% [5]. Hence UMTS is between 5 and 140 times more efficient than GSM.

expecting capacity will come from the evolution of UMTS. This expected rates offered by Bluetooth and Broadband Radio Access Networks (BRANs) in155Mb/s (with mobility) and HiPerLAN is 5 GB/s in UMTS.

3.2.1 Bluetooth
Bluetooth uses short data packets and also flexible packet types. So Bluetooth throughput is optimized during periods of interference. Frequency changes are very quick, i.e., at 1600 hops per second [5]. Performance rates of Bluetooth can be maintained in noisy environments. The second generation of Bluetooth will aim for a 2Mbps data rate. Bluetooths blocking probability is expected to be lower than UMTS. Additionally, dual mode data terminals may operate on both Bluetooth and conventional urban UMTS. Through above technology, Bluetooth should return live video based interactive news reports from fixed urban locations.

3.2.2 Broadband Radio Access Networks

In 3rd generation development, higher bandwidths (up to 155Mb/s) will be provided by microwave Broadband Radio Access Networks (BRANs) [2, 5]. Corporate multimedia users are likely to demand higher bit rates than UMTS will be able to offer. BRAN with its mobility and high bit rate offers the possibility of mobile interactive video news reports.

3.1 Applications over UMTS

1. UMTS Spectrum: Terrestrial UMTS has been assigned 2* 60MHz (given over to W-CDMA) of paired and 35MHz (given over to TDD CDMA) of unpaired spectrum. 2. UMTS Videophone: UMTS offer high bit rate. However two shortcomings exist with this service. 1. The problem of mobile transmission: which are being approached in MPEG 2. Flat screen technology 3. Video News Reports Over UMTS: Current mobile network data capacities and compression algorithms could not support the transportation of acceptable quality video. But the UMTS offer the required bit rate for video and could make the transportation of compressed video news reports via mobile networks possible. The bit rates for broadcast news are unlikely to be supported by UMTS and also the making MPEG-2 via mobile networks untenable unless a method of expanding the UMTS bit rates. Same as multiple GSM data channels and additional coding have been proposed for returning live audio contributions and enhancement to video coding are integrated to UMTS. MPEG-4 video and audio coding promise bit rates suitable for news reporting via full capacity UMTS [2, 5]. Multiple UMTS channels use for outside broadcasts.

3.2.3 Newsgathering
The merger of GSM, DECT, UMTS, Bluetooth, BRAN, and HiPerLan will provide big technical challenges before the one handset concept can be realized. But in new systems offer the higher bit rates. This evaluated UMTS coupled with trends in compression bode. That is well for the future of live video based news interviews. From a newsgathering stance, the plethora of new radio based services will offer new opportunities for live reporting.

3.3 Impact of Broadcasting and Multimedia Services on UMTS

The launch of Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) and Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) are the new area in broadcasting [2, 5]. The allocation of space on a DVB or DAB multiplex for data/multimedia services threatens to compete against UMTS. Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) is unlikely to be able to support high bit rate interactive multimedia services limiting. DAB is impact on the classic perceived market place of UMTS. DVB developers have planned a future upgrade to a DVB HDTV format and pending the arrival of consumer receivers with acceptable costs. The impact of DVB carrying both HDTV and SDTV needs to be assessed before one can determine the total bit rate pool. Its available for distribution of multimedia between users.

3.2 Technology beyond UMTS

UMTS will be the delivery of multimedia in higher data rate. But corporate users within office environments are expected to demand higher bit rates than UMTS will be able to offer. This

3.3.1 DAB via UMTS

Distribution of audio radio programs by other media than broadcast radio channels. It is not a new concept. The low coded rates of the MPEG-2 bit streams employed within DAB. These are suitable for transportation, either in selective or regional formats, over UMTS. The bit rate of MPEG-2 coupled with its low tolerance to errors, that is due to the critical nature of some coded bits and the Huffman coding and probably makes it unsuitable for the broadcast of multiple radio programs via UMTS. However, the MPEG-4 range of algorithms could enable the broadcast of multiple high quality radio channels over UMTS. The user could either select the service via the 144kb/s format or be a UMTS channel could be dedicated to broadcasting popular channels like Radio One.

would not be able to obtain radio resources temporarily in periods of high load. This bandwidth oscillation can effect to significant throughput degradation. That is affected by some factors such as spurious TCP retransmissions. RRM functions can significantly affect TCP performance. RRM functionalities impact on TCP behavior. That is the load control mechanism. Bandwidth for TCP traffic could be reduced momentarily. That happened when most radio resources are assigned to real-time traffic.

4.1 Load Control Strategy and UTRAN Interface in UMTS

The Downlink Shared Channel (DSCH) is a common channel designed to optimize code usage in UMTS downlink. DSCH is intended by sharing a sub-tree of Orthogonal Variable Spreading Factor (OVSF) codes among several users. The radio resource assignment algorithm addressed in this analysis is based on the scheduling strategy. That introduced in for a Downlink Shared Channel (DSCH). DSCH may allow the number of transmissions. That apart from being limited by the number of allowed codes and also that is must be limited by controlling the total power consumption and the load factor increase produced by this channel. The goal of this load control strategy is to avoid interference peaks in the radio channel and that would deteriorate other services with QoS constraints more sensitive to radio block errors (e.g. radio block delays in conversational services).this radio resources are allocated to every 10ms-frame following a three-step procedure[3]. 1. Capacity Requirement: An estimation of the amount of resources required is managed by the radio resource manager for each served user. A guaranteed rate basic principle is used at this stage. A guaranteed rate is used to decide the amount of resources required for a TCP connection. 2. Prioritization: Users are prioritized based on their requirements such as; users are prioritized according to the type of service that is first prioritization level and for the same type of service, according to their Quality of Service (QoS) requirements that is second prioritization level. In second prioritization level, users are ordered so that connections having rates below second prioritization level guaranteed targets are served first. So, resource sharing among users will tend to guarantee a mean bit rate for each connection. 3. Availability checks and loads Control: After the above level that is prioritization of the users to be served. Available resources are estimated in the radio resource controller by computing the expected load factor and transmission power in each Base Station (BS). So, load control algorithm checks whether or not this selection is possible depending on the available resources and modifies it accordingly. In the implemented algorithm, voice users are always served, while for TCP-based users (i.e. interactive traffic class), transmissions are carried out only if the estimated network load factor falls below a given threshold (neta).

3.3.2 UMTS DVB Interface

DVB has published a set of professional and consumer receiver interfaces. These are summarized in, DVB. Should this be highlighted the application of a UMTS interface within the DVB standard forum represents another opportunity for the merger of broadcasting and UMTS which will only enhance the development and use of UMTS as a newsgathering tool.

3.3.3 Return Channel

A requirement for interactive TV has been identified by the Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) commercial requirements. Both interactive TV and multimedia services require an interaction (or return) channel to be provided from the user back to the broadcaster. Of interest to this work is the lack of presence (within the standards) of existing and future mobile data terminals as a return channel for either interactive TV or data broadcasting. Considering the bit rates demanded by (i.e. 0.38kb/s,0.76kb/s, 6.83kb/s and 27.33kb/s) GSM could act as a return channel and also it is known that HSCSD. HSCSD could provide at least 30kb/s assuming small data packets and a low percentage of HSCSD users to normal bearer services. UMTS could be employed as a return channel.

4. Impact of UMTS load control mechanisms on TCP

Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is a third generation wireless cellular system. UMTS supports the transmission of voice, data and multimedia traffic. UMTS is using the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) in several applications such as e-mail and World Wide Web [1, 3]. A major part within UMTS is the Radio Resource Management (RRM) functionality [3]. RRM is use to charge of the allocation of resources by scheduling algorithms, admission, congestion, power and handover control. RRM strategies are use in the UMTS air interface. RRM strategies are usually based on service class prioritization and packet data scheduling. That can have a great effect on TCP performance. This radio resource control strategy may produce a kind of bandwidth oscillation. That may effect on TCP traffic

4.2 RRM strategies in UTRAN

RRM strategies are supported by the protocol stack of the UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN). The radio interface of the UTRAN is layered into three protocol layers [3]: 1. The physical layer (L1). 2. The data link layer (L2). 3. The network layer (L3). Additionally, The data link layer is split into two sub layers, a. RLC b. Medium access control (MAC). On the other hand, The RLC and L3 protocols are partitioned in two planes, a) user plane b) control plane In the control plane, L3 is partitioned into sub layers where only the lowest sub layer, denoted radio resource control (RRC), terminates in the UTRAN. Connections between RRC and MAC as well as RRC and L1 provide local interlayer control services and allow the RRC to control the configuration of the lower layers. In the MAC layer, logical channels are mapped to transport channels. A transport channel defines the way in which traffic from logical channels is processed and sent to the physical layer. The smallest entity of traffic that can be transmitted through a transport channel is a Transport Block (TB). The number of TBs transmitted in a TTI indicates that different bit rates are associated with different TFs. Transmission Time Interval (TTI) is once in a certain period of time. A given number of TBs will be delivered to the physical layer in order to introduce some coding characteristics, interleaving, and rate matching to the radio frame. User Equipment (UE) may have more than one transport channel simultaneously. The TF Combination (TFC) refers to the selected combination of TFs. The list of allowed TFCs to be used is referred to as the Transport Format Combination Set (TFCS).

Results show that, The lower the load threshold is, the better the behavior of voice packets error ratio is since less data traffic is served in the DSCH channels. So, network operators should use a proper value for the network load threshold in order to satisfy QoS requirements for conversational traffic. Notice that a neta of threshold =100% means that no load restrictions are applied on DSCH channels. On the other hand, for interactive traffic, if neta of threshold is below 70% the performance of TCP traffic significantly decreases due to an excessive packet loss. This packet loss is due to buffer overflows since the available bandwidth for DSCH is drastically reduced. This situation also leads to reduced TCP throughput values. However, if the network load threshold ranges between 70-90% the TCP packet loss is kept at a minimum value (1%) and TCP throughput almost reaches its maximum allowed value (achieved when no load restrictions are applied)[3]. Therefore, using network load threshold values above 90% has no advantage at all since TCP traffic throughput does not improve and voice quality is even further degraded, especially in very high traffic load conditions (600 www users). The delay values difference above 90% is not significant. These delays refer to an IP packet, which is the Service Data Unit (SDU) delivered to the RLC layer. This effect also indicates that there is an optimum margin for the network load threshold value that enables to offer a certain QoS level for voice users while handling TCP traffic as if no load limitations were applied. Through the above result, we can conclude a realistic and highly loaded UMTS network (voice users are prioritized over TCP users), TCP performance could be maintained if proper network load threshold values are selected and also if the networks load threshold value is around 80% then, a good TCP throughput is obtained and a good trade-off between packet loss ratio for voice users.

5. UMTS Evolution
Here I mentioned some of the forthcoming capabilities of UMTS, such as High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA).Technology experts worldwide are continuing to improve UMTS, empowering it with new capabilities that operators can phase in over time. New version of UMTS has deployed UMTS Release 99, the first deployable version of UMTS. Release 99 contains additional features such as video conferencing over circuitswitched connections that old version of UMTS has not yet implemented. After Release 99, version numbers are by release version rather than by year, and currently include Releases 4, 5, and 6.These successive versions add features such as: High Speed Uplink Packet Access (HSUPA) Comprehensive multimedia capabilities through a subsystem called IP-based Multimedia Services (IMS) Handling of voice functions in the packet domain (voice over IP) Integrated support for access networks based on WLAN Common radio resource management between GSM, GPRS, EDGE, and UMTS

4.3 UMTS emulator

Real time UMTS emulator developed within the framework of the IST ARROWS project to measure the TCP performance. The UMTS emulator is a real-time operation HW/SW platform. UMTS emulator includes multimedia terminals, UMTS elements and IP connectivity. Through the Real time UMTS emulator, we can remark the possibility of validating RRM strategies under complex scenarios and testing the impact of RRM strategies over the end-to-end behavior of legacy IP-based multimedia applications with Quality of Service (QoS) requirements. The external organization of the UMTS testbed is composed by the UE, the UTRAN, and the UMTS Core Network (CN) [3]. Different applications such as WEB browsing are executed in the UE and IP Server for a reference user under test.

7. Future direction of UMTS

UMTS performance may not be sufficient to meet needs of future high-performance applications. In UMTS will be unable to provide a comprehensive IP solution where voice, data and streamed multimedia can be given to users on an "Anytime, Anywhere" basis, and at higher data rates. So, these features are expected by todays mobile communication end users. UMTS is want to develop to accommodate the quality of service (QoS) and rate requirements set by forthcoming applications like wireless broadband access, Multimedia Messaging Service, video chat, mobile TV, High definition TV content and Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB). UMTS is based on two parallel infrastructures consisting of circuit switched and packet switched network nodes. So, this will require high-latency data transmission. UMTS is wanted to develop based on packet switching only. This will require low-latency data transmission. Looking more into the future, mobile cellular systems will have to accommodate a variety of different radio access networks including short-range wireless technologies, connected to a common core network. On the user side the concept of a monolithic terminal, as we know it, is dissolving. Distributed terminal architectures are appearing whose components are interconnected by short-range radio links.

Reference:
[1] Antonis Alexiou , Christos Bouras , Vaggelis Igglesis, Performance Evaluation of TCP over UMTS Transport Channels, Research Academic Computer Technology Institute, Greece [2] DevCentral White Paper (April 2004), UMTS Capabilities, Technology, and Applications [3] Juan Rendon, Ramon Ferrus, Anna Sfairopoulou, and Ferran Casadevall(June 2006.), Impact of UMTS load control mechanisms on TCP, IST Mobile and Wireless Communications, Mykonos, Greece, [4] K. Boman, G. Horn, P. Howard, and V. Niemi (October 2002), UMTS Security, IEE Electronics & Communication Engineering Journal [5] Neale J.D, 1 Jones E.V, and Zubrzycki J.T, Implications of UMTS on Digital Broadcasting an Newsgathering,, EMSTechnologies Canada, University of Essex, UK and BBC Research and Development, UK.

8. Discussion
UMTS allow very high-speed multimedia services such videoconferencing, full motion video, and Internet access and builds on the capability of todays mobile technologies by providing increased capacity, data capability. TCP could not perform efficiently in wireless environments because TCP over UMTS has a much high bit error rate. A variety of protocols are employed to carry IP packets through the UMTS infrastructure. however, a realistic and highly loaded UMTS network (voice users are prioritized over TCP users), TCP performance could be maintained if proper network load threshold values are selected and also if the networks load threshold value is around 80% then, a good TCP throughput is obtained and a good trade-off between packet loss ratio for voice users. Beyond UMTS new high data rate services offer high quality live video news interviews, broadcasting, communications and computing merging. Bluetooth, Broadband Radio Access Networks (BRAN) and HiPerLan are new high data rate services to beyond UMTS.

9. Acknowledgements
I wish to acknowledge my Supervisor Miss.GU Ganegoda for supporting the independent study and also to Faculty of Information Technology, University of Moratuwa for helping to find the resource. .