Apparatus, Systems and Methods for Prioritizing Frequency Selection for a Mobile Device

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016353460-A1
Application number	US-201514725764-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	May 29, 2015
Priority date	May 29, 2015
Publication date	Dec 1, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

Described herein are systems and methods for prioritizing frequency selection of a user equipment (“UE”) having a transceiver configured to enable the UE to establish a connection with a network using at least two communication protocols. A method may comprise recording, at the UE, a camped frequency and a camped band with which the UE is communicating with the first network in the first protocol, disconnecting from the first network and connecting to the second network, and disconnecting from the second network and reconnecting to the first network, wherein the reconnecting to the first network includes determining whether one of the camped frequency or a different frequency within the camped band is available for reconnection to the first network, and reconnecting to the first network using the one of the camped frequency or the different frequency within the camped band.

First claim

1 . A method, comprising:
at a user equipment (“UE”) having a transceiver configured to enable the UE to establish a connection to a first network at a camped frequency within a camped band using a first protocol and a second network using a second protocol:
disconnecting from the first network and connecting to the second network; and
disconnecting from the second network and reconnecting to the first network, wherein the reconnecting to the first network includes:
determining whether one of the camped frequency or a different frequency within the camped band is available for reconnection to the first network prior to searching any other frequencies, and
reconnecting to the first network using the one of the camped frequency or the different frequency within the camped band.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the camped frequency has a higher priority than the different frequency within the camped band, wherein the camped frequency is used to reconnect if the camped frequency is available.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein determining whether the different frequency within the camped band is available, comprises:
performing a cell search in the camped band.

4 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
performing a cell search within other frequency bands of the first network when neither the camped frequency nor camped band is available.

5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the first network is a Long Term Evolution (LTE) network.

6 . The method of claim 5 , wherein the LTE network includes a plurality of evolved Node Bs (eNB) and the UE reconnects to the LTE network via one of the plurality of eNBs.

7 . The method of claim 5 , wherein the LTE network supports a time-division duplexing (“TDD”) mode and a frequency-division duplexing (“FDD”) mode.

8 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the second network is one of a GSM, CDMA, CDMA2000, 1×RTT, 1×, and a legacy radio access network.

9 . A user equipment (“UE”), comprising:
a transceiver configured to enable the UE to establish a connection to a first network at a camped frequency within a camped band using a first protocol and a second network using a second protocol; and
a processor configured to:
instruct the transceiver to disconnect the UE from the first network and connect the UE to the second network; and
instruct the transceiver to disconnect the UE from the second network and reconnect the UE to the first network, wherein the reconnecting to the first network includes:
scanning only the camped frequency to determine if the camped frequency is available; and
when the camped frequency is available, reconnecting to the first network, using the camped frequency.

10 . The UE of claim 9 , wherein the reconnecting to the first network further includes:
when the camped frequency is not available, scanning only the different frequencies within the camped band to determine which of the different frequencies within the camped band are available; and when at least one of the different frequencies within the camped band is available, reconnecting to the first network using the one of the different frequencies within the camped band.

11 . The UE of claim 10 , wherein the reconnecting to the first network further includes:
when none of the different frequencies within the camped band are available, scanning frequencies outside of the camped band to determine which of the frequencies outside of the camped band are available; and reconnecting to the first network using one of the available frequencies outside of the camped band.

12 . The UE of claim 9 , wherein the transceiver comprises a plurality of transceivers.

13 . The UE of claim 9 , wherein the first network is a Long Term Evolution (LTE) network.

14 . The UE of claim 13 , wherein the LTE network includes a plurality of evolved Node Bs (eNB) and the UE reconnects to the LTE network via one of the plurality of eNBs.

15 . The UE of claim 13 , wherein the LTE network supports a time-division duplexing (“TDD”) mode and a frequency-division duplexing (“FDD”) mode.

16 . The UE of claim 9 , wherein the second network is one of a GSM, CDMA, CDMA2000, 1×RTT, 1×, and a legacy radio access network.

17 . A non-volatile computer-readable medium that stores instructions that, when executed, cause the performance of any action or combination of actions including:
disconnecting from the first network and connecting to the second network; and disconnecting from the second network and reconnecting to the first network, wherein the reconnecting to the first network includes:
determining whether one of a camped frequency or a different frequency within a camped band is available for reconnection to the first network prior to searching any other frequencies, and
reconnecting to the first network using the one of the camped frequency or the different frequency within the camped band.

18 . The non-volatile computer-readable medium of claim 17 , wherein the camped frequency has a higher priority than the different frequency within the camped band, wherein the camped frequency is used to reconnect if the camped frequency is available.

19 . The non-volatile computer-readable medium of claim 17 , wherein determining whether the different frequency within the camped band is available, comprises:
performing a cell search in the camped band.

20 . The non-volatile computer-readable medium of claim 17 , wherein the actions further include:
performing a cell search within other frequency bands of the first network when neither the camped frequency nor camped band is available.

Assignees

• Apple Inc

Inventors

• Balakrishnan Swaminathan
• Vangala Sarma V
• Vallath Sreevalsan
• Sharma Prateek

Classifications

• H04W72/56 Primary

  based on priority criteria · CPC title

• H04W72/0453

  Resources in frequency domain, e.g. a carrier in FDMA · CPC title

• H04W48/14

  using user query {or user detection} · CPC title

• H04W72/10 Primary

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04W48/18 Primary

  Selecting a network or a communication service · CPC title