Apparatus for distributed antenna system with downlink transmission power control

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9693321-B2
Application number	US-201514677696-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 2, 2015
Priority date	Apr 5, 2010
Publication date	Jun 27, 2017
Grant date	Jun 27, 2017

Abstract

A system and method for dynamically optimizing the performance of indoor distributed antenna systems communicate to user equipment is disclosed. The user equipment measures information describing the downlink signals such as the downlink data rates, the quality of the received signal, and the location of the user equipment. A service module collects this information and determines an optimized power level for each of the antenna units. The service module may optimize only one antenna unit power level or a subset of the antenna units within the distributed antenna system in a preferred embodiment. One or more of the antenna units then transmits downlink signals with the optimized power levels. The optimized power level may be less than the initial power level in a preferred embodiment. As a result, the performance of the indoor distributed antenna systems is enhanced.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An apparatus for a distributed antenna system (DAS) configured to communicate with a plurality of remote antenna units to extend coverage for at least one base station, the apparatus comprising:
transceiver circuitry to receive downlink signals from the at least one base station for communications to the remote antenna units and to transmit uplink signals to the at least one base station based on signals received from the remote antenna units; and
controller circuitry operatively coupled to the remote antenna units and configured to control multiple transmissions of the downlink signals from the transceiver circuitry to the remote antenna units via a common downlink signal, including controlling downlink transmission power levels of the remote antenna units, using the common downlink signal and based, at least in part, on signal information received from at least one of the remote antenna units,
wherein the downlink signals are transmitted by the transceiver circuitry to multiple antenna units of the remote antenna units, and the remote antenna units are to provide coverage within a service area of the distributed antenna system.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the transceiver circuitry is further configured to:
convert radio-frequency (RF) downlink signals received from the at least one base station to digital downlink signals;
provide the digital downlink signals to the remote antenna units for conversion into RF downlink signals for transmission within the service area;
receive digital uplink signals from the remote antenna units; and
convert the digital uplink signals to RF uplink signals for transmission to the at least one base station.

3. The apparatus of claim 2 wherein the controller circuitry is configured to:
provide a common downlink signal to the remote antenna units; and
set the downlink transmission power levels of the remote antenna units.

4. The apparatus of claim 3 wherein the downlink transmission power levels are based, at least in part, on the signal information.

5. The apparatus of claim 3 wherein the common downlink signal comprises a pilot signal.

6. The apparatus of claim 3 wherein the signal information comprises interference estimations collected from signal information at the remote antenna units.

7. The apparatus of claim 3 wherein the signal information comprises quality-of-service (QoS) information collected from signal information at the remote antenna units.

8. The apparatus of claim 3 wherein the signal information comprises downlink rate and location information collected from signal information at the remote antenna units.

9. The apparatus of claim 3 wherein the signal information comprises signal information collected at the remote antenna units from one or more user equipments (UEs).

10. The apparatus of claim 3 wherein the signal information comprises signal information collected at one or more remote antenna units from signals transmitted by another one or more remote antenna units.

11. The apparatus of claim 3 further comprising an interface between the controller circuitry and the remote antenna units, wherein the controller circuitry is configured to provide command signals over the interface for configuring the downlink transmissions by the remote antenna units.

12. The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the command signals are configured to individually set downlink transmission power levels of the remote antenna units.

13. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the controller circuitry is further configured to analyze interference levels and select frequencies for the RF downlink signals utilized by the remote antenna units.

14. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the remote antenna units are configured to monitor network conditions and provide feedback for use by the apparatus to control transmission of downlink signals.

15. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the DAS is configured to operate as part of wireless cellular network in accordance with a long-term evaluation (LTE) standard.

16. The apparatus of claim 1 wherein the DAS is configured to be employed in a building to improve coverage within the building.

17. A method for operating a distributed antenna system (DAS) configured to communicate with a plurality of remote antenna units to extend coverage for at least one base station, the method comprising:
receiving downlink signals from the at least one base station for communications to the remote antenna units;
transmitting uplink signals to the at least one base station based on signals received from the remote antenna units; and
controlling multiple transmission of the downlink signals to the remote antenna units, including control of downlink transmission power levels of the remote antenna units using a common downlink signal and based, at least in part, on signal information received from at least one of the remote antenna units,
wherein the remote antenna units are to provide coverage within a service area of the distributed antenna system.

18. The method of claim 17 further comprising:
converting radio-frequency (RF) downlink signals received from the at least one base station to digital downlink signals;
providing the digital downlink signals to the remote antenna units for conversion into RF downlink signals for transmission within the service area;
receiving digital uplink signals from the remote antenna units; and
converting the digital uplink signals to RF uplink signals for transmission to the at least one base station.

19. The method of claim 17 further comprising:
providing a common downlink signal to the remote antenna units; and
setting the downlink transmission power levels of the remote antenna units.

20. The method of claim 19 wherein the downlink transmission power levels are set based, at least in part, on the signal information, and wherein the signal information comprises signal information collected at the remote antenna units from one or more user equipments (UEs).

21. A distributed antenna system (DAS) configured to extend coverage within a building, the DAS comprising:
a plurality of remote antenna units to provide coverage within the building;
transceiver circuitry to receive downlink signals from at least one base station for communications to the remote antenna units and to transmit uplink signals to the at least one base station based on signals received from the remote antenna units; and
controller circuitry to control multiple transmissions of the downlink signals from the transceiver circuitry to the remote antenna units via a common downlink signal, including controlling downlink transmission power levels of the remote antenna units, using the common downlink signal and based, at least in part, on signal information received from at least one of the remote antenna units,
wherein the signal information comprises signal information collected at the remote antenna units from one or more user equipments (UEs).

22. The DAS of claim 21 wherein the controller circuitry is configured to:
provide a common downlink signal to the remote antenna units; and
set the downlink transmission power levels of the remote antenna units based, at least in part, on the signal information, wherein the common downlink signal comprises a pilot signal.

23. The DAS of claim 22 wherein the signal information comprises interference estimations collected from signal information at the remote antenna units.

24. The DAS of

Assignees

• Intel Corp

Inventors

• Venkatraman Shankar
• Sheikh Khurram Parviz

Classifications

• H04W52/265 Primary

  taking into account the quality of service QoS · CPC title

• H04W52/267

  taking into account the information rate · CPC title

• H04W52/143 Primary

  Downlink power control · CPC title

• H04W24/06

  Testing, {supervising or monitoring} using simulated traffic · CPC title

• H04W52/40 Primary

  during macro-diversity or soft handoff · CPC title