Benchmark Activities over Major Dutch Cities has been performed bu arimas engineers to measure differences between major operators based on SIGNAL STRENGTH, SIGNAL QUALITY, THROUGHPUT, & BROWSING SPEED.

Purpose of the activity, subject of the Project, was to evaluate LTE radio coverage and acquire KPIs values.

Measurement activity, performed in drive test mode and/or on predetermined fixed points, has been aimed to evaluate the coverage and performances of mobile networks of the operators affected by the new technology LTE for:

• • • TELE 2
    • VODAFONE
    • KPN
    • T-MOBILE

Primary objective of the activity was assess the presence and quality, in the specifics geographic areas as in the picture beside, of Operators object of this Benchmarking
Acquire the QoS of 4G services by predetermined geographical points and points of interest in indoor stations and airports for benchmarking the quality of data connectivity offered by the operators

The choice of Smartphone based instruments therefore USB sticks, or LTE based solutions Scanner, was motivated by the wish to obtain values of QoS-related effective “User Experience”.

In fact, as also described in the ITU-T, the 4G Network Performance Experience depend sensitively on the new features related to 4G devices.

So it has been essential to use test traffic generated by Smartphone to take due account of the ‘”overhead” signalling that nonetheless engages the network but does not result in the Payload / traffic useful to the user.

In other words, different configurations of the network may introduce different effects performance of the network itself!

Test Description

• • • Dynamic Test Script: The scanner has been used to carry out measurements in the bands 800/1800/2600 and in the 1800/2600 as well, in order to achieve measures for all operators. In addition, all UE worked with “IDLE and AUTOMODE” to ensure the effective recognition of the cover / LTE cells.
    • Static Test Script: For each measuring point static as well as for each measurement point in the indoor areas of airports and stations has been rolling a sessions with duration between 10 to 15 minutes in order to assess:
      • Throughput Downlink
      • Uplink Throughput
      • Rebuffering Time
      • Number of Rebuffering per session

The scanner has been used to carry out measurements in the bands 800/1800/2600 and in the 1800/2600 as well, in order to achieve measures for all operators.