Method and apparatus for measurement and identification of co-channel interfering transmitters

Abstract

A methodology and apparatus for measurement and identification of co-channel interferers in a GSM cellular wireless communication network is provided as part of a network survey (e.g., drive test). Repetitive time-of-arrival measurements of detected FCCH bursts on a given frequency channel are made in conjunction with power level and C/I ratio measurements of such FCCH bursts. Successful FCCH burst detection triggers SCH detection/decoding and successful SCH decoding triggers BCCH detection/decoding. Successfully decoded SCH BSIC data and possibly BCCH CellId data is associated with the corresponding FCCH burst information based on their time-of-arrival. This association is possible even with the FCCH bursts for which SCH and BCCH decoding was not successful due to the interference or some other impairment. It is sufficient to successfully decode SCH/BCCH only once per cell during the network survey in order for all detected FCCH bursts coming from this cell to be properly assigned to it. This does not requiring a priori knowledge of the network configuration or its geographical layout. Such methodology (and apparatus) can readily be adapted for other Time-Division-Multiple-Access (TDMA) cellular wireless networks.