ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)

Reconfigurable Radio Systems (RRS); SDR Reference Architecture for Mobile Device

DTR/RRS-02002

General Information

• Status: Published
• Publication Date: 24-Mar-2009
• Technical Committee: RRS 2 - REA - Reconfigurable Radio Equipment Architecture
• Current Stage: 12 - Completion
• Due Date: 26-Mar-2009
• Completion Date: 25-Mar-2009

Standards Content (Sample)

ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)
Technical Report


Reconfigurable Radio Systems (RRS);
SDR Reference Architecture for Mobile Device

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2 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)



Reference
DTR/RRS-02002
Keywords
architecture, radio
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3 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)
Contents
Intellectual Property Rights . 4
Foreword . 4
Introduction . 4
1 Scope . 5
2 References . 5
2.1 Normative references . 5
2.2 Informative references . 5
3 Definitions and abbreviations . 6
3.1 Definitions . 6
3.2 Abbreviations . 7
4 Requirements on SDR equipment for mobile device . 8
4.1 Architecture requirements . 9
4.2 Operational requirements . 9
4.3 Capability requirements . 9
4.4 Interface requirements . 9
4.5 Other requirements . 10
5 SDR reference architecture for mobile device . 10
5.1 Operating environment . 10
5.2 Radio Computer Concept . 11
5.3 Programmable Radios . 12
5.4 SDR Reference Architecture . 13
5.5 Unified Radio Application (URA) . 14
5.6 Multiradio Access Interface (MURI) . 15
5.7 Unified Radio Application Interface (URAI) . 16
5.8 Radio Programming Interface (RPI). 17
5.9 Reconfigurable RF Interface (RRFI) . 18
6 Survey on SDR standardization for mobile devices . 18
6.1 OMG Software Radio Specification . 18
6.2 IEEE SCC41 Working Group P1900.4 . 19
6.3 IEEE 802.22 Wireless Regional Area Networks (WRAN) . 19
6.4 IEEE 802.21 Media Independent Handover . 19
6.5 MIPI DigRF. 20
6.6 3GPP recent progress . 21
6.7 OpenMAX Application Programming Interface for Multimedia . 21
7 Summary and recommendations . 22
History . 23

ETSI

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4 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)
Intellectual Property Rights
IPRs essential or potentially essential to the present document may have been declared to ETSI. The information
pertaining to these essential IPRs, if any, is publicly available for ETSI members and non-members, and can be found
in ETSI SR 000 314: "Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs); Essential, or potentially Essential, IPRs notified to ETSI in
respect of ETSI standards", which is available from the ETSI Secretariat. Latest updates are available on the ETSI Web
server (http://webapp.etsi.org/IPR/home.asp).
Pursuant to the ETSI IPR Policy, no investigation, including IPR searches, has been carried out by ETSI. No guarantee
can be given as to the existence of other IPRs not referenced in ETSI SR 000 314 (or the updates on the ETSI Web
server) which are, or may be, or may become, essential to the present document.
Foreword
This Technical Report (TR) has been produced by ETSI Technical Committee Reconfigurable Radio Systems (RRS).
Introduction
The present document provides a feasibility study on creating a reference architecture for such mobile devices which
are capable to use technological elements known as Software Defined Radio. Such mobile devices will operate as
functional elements in reconfigurable radio systems by using multiple different radio standards simultaneously.
As a feasibility study the present document provides basis for decision making at ETSI Board level on standardization
of some or all topics of the SDR Reference Architecture for Mobile Device.
ETSI

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5 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)
1 Scope
The present document describes the reference architecture for SDR equipped mobile devices, which allows them to
operate as part of reconfigurable radio systems. The reference architecture is outlined in the present document to the
extent which is necessary to identify architectural elements (components and interfaces) as candidates for further
standardization. As a basis for the reference architecture common requirements for such a SDR mobile device are also
in the scope of the present document. Since the feasibility of standardization of architectural elements for SDR mobile
devices also depends on already standardized or ongoing activities on such architectural elements the present document
also provides a survey on SDR standardization in other SDOs.
2 References
References are either specific (identified by date of publication and/or edition number or version number) or
non-specific.
• For a specific reference, subsequent revisions do not apply.
• Non-specific reference may be made only to a complete document or a part thereof and only in the following
cases:
- if it is accepted that it will be possible to use all future changes of the referenced document for the
purposes of the referring document;
- for informative references.
Referenced documents which are not found to be publicly available in the expected location might be found at
http://docbox.etsi.org/Reference.
NOTE: While any hyperlinks included in this clause were valid at the time of publication ETSI cannot guarantee
their long term validity.
2.1 Normative references
The following referenced documents are indispensable for the application of the present document. For dated
references, only the cited version applies. For non-specific references, the latest version of the referenced document
(including any amendments) applies.
Not applicable.
2.2 Informative references
The following referenced documents are not essential to the use of the present document but they assist the user with
regard to a particular subject area. For non-specific references, the latest version of the referenced document (including
any amendments) applies.
[i.1] OMG sbc/07-06-07: "Software Radio Specification Overview".
[i.2] IEEE P1900.4: "Draft Standard for Architectural building blocks enabling network-device
distributed decision making for optimized radio resource usage in heterogeneous wireless access
networks".
[i.3] IEEE P802.22: "Draft Standard for White Spaces".
[i.4] IEEE P802.21: "Draft Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks: Media Independent
Handover Services".
[i.5] The MIPI Alliance.
NOTE: Web page at http://www.mipi.org/wgoverview.shtml.
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6 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)
[i.6] ETSI TR 125 913: "Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS); LTE; Requirements
for Evolved UTRA (E-UTRA) and Evolved UTRAN (E-UTRAN) (3GPP TR 25.913 version 8.0.0
Release 8)".
[i.7] 3GPP TR 36.913: "Technical Specification Group Radio Access Network; Requirements for
Further Advancements for E-UTRA (LTE-Advanced) (Release 8)".
[i.8] RP-080758 Work Item: "Description on RF requirements for Multicarrier and Multi-RAT BS",
TSG-RAN Meeting #41, Kobe, Japan, 9 - 12 September 2008.
[i.9] "The Khronos Group OpenMAX Integration, Development and Application Layer Programming
Interface Specifications, 2008".
3 Definitions and abbreviations
3.1 Definitions
For the purposes of the present document, the following terms and definitions apply:
mobile device: personal communication device (e.g. mobile phone, PDA, laptop PC etc) capable of communicating
either locally (e.g. Bluetooth), through a network (e.g. GSM) or both by using one or more radio technologies
radio application: software application executing in a software defined multiradio equipment
NOTE: Radio application is typically designed to use certain radio frequency band(s) and it includes agreed
schemes for multiple access, modulation, channel and data coding as well as control protocols for all
radio layers needed to maintain user data links between adjacent radio equipments, which run the same
radio application
radio equipment: equipment using radio technology
radio system: system, which consists of a number of radio equipments using at least one common radio technology
radio technology: technology for wireless transmission and/or reception of electromagnetic radiation for information
transfer
software defined radio: radio in which the RF operating parameters including, but not limited to, frequency range,
modulation type, or output power can be set or altered by software, and/or the technique by which this is achieved
NOTE 1: Excludes changes to operating parameters which occur during the normal pre-installed and predetermined
operation of a radio according to a system specification or standard.
NOTE 2: SDR is an implementation technique applicable to many radio technologies and standards.
NOTE 3: SDR techniques are applicable to both transmitters and receivers.
software defined multiradio: device or technology where multiple radio technologies can coexist and share their
wireless transmission and/or reception capabilities, including but not limited to regulated parameters, by operating them
under a common software system
NOTE 1: Examples of the regulated parameters are frequency range, modulation type, and output power.
NOTE 2: Common software system represents radio operating system functions.
NOTE 3: This definition does not restrict the way software is used to set and/or change the parameters. In one
example, this can be done by the algorithm of the already running software. In another example, software
downloading may be required.
software defined radio equipment: radio equipment supporting SDR technology
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7 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)
3.2 Abbreviations
For the purposes of the present document, the following abbreviations apply:
API Application Programming Interface
ASIC Application Specific Integrated Circuit
ASIP Application Specific Instruction Processor
BB BaseBand
BBIC BB Integrated Circuit
CDR Computer Defined Radio
CM Configuration Manager
CMOS Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor
CORBA Common Object Requesting Broker Architecture
CR Cognitive Radio
DSP Digital Signal Processor
EMR Electro-Magnetic Radiation
FC Flow Controller
GGSN Gateway GPRS Support Node
GPRS General Packet Radio System
HW HardWare
IP Internet Protocol
NOTE: As in TCP/IP.
IP Intellectual Property
NOTE: As in semiconductor IP.
JTRS Joint Tactical Radio System
LTE Long Term Evolution
MDA Model Driven Architecture
MIH Media Independent Handover
MIHF Media Independent Handover Function
MIPI Mobile Industry Processor Interface
MRC MultiRadio Controller
MURI MUltiRadio access Interface
OFDM Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing
OMD Object Management group
PDA Personal Digital Assistant
PIM Platform Independent Model
PMSE Program Making and Special Events
PSM Platform Specific Model
RCM Radio Connection Manager
RF Radio Frequency
RFIC RF integrated circuit
RM Resource Manager
RPI Radio Programming Interface
RRFI Reconfigurable RF Interface
RRS Reconfigurable Radio System
SCA Software Communications Architecture
SDF Synchronized Data Flow
SDO Standards Development Organization
SDR Software Defined Radio
SIMD Single Instruction Multiple Data
TCP Transport Control Protocol
URA Unified Radio Application
URAI Unified Radio Application Interface
WCDMA Wideband Code Division Multiple Access
WLAN Wireless Local Area Network
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4 Requirements on SDR equipment for mobile device
This clause collects the requirements on SDR equipments for mobile devices as presented by a number of stakeholders,
including but not limited to radio chipset vendors, mobile device manufacturers and network operators. These
requirements have been taken into account in the reference architecture described in the present document.
Requirements discussed below are categorized into 5 groups:
1) General architectural requirements.
2) Capability requirements.
3) Operational requirements.
4) Interface requirements.
5) Other requirements.
The potential business relationships between different mobile device SDR stakeholders are illustrated in figure 1.
Consumer
Semiconductor
Mobile device
HW & SW
markets
manufacturer
Foundry
platform with
SDR Radio
Computer
SDR Tool
Radios as SW
Platform provider
Provider
Semiconductor
Radio application
provider
IP provider
(SW vendor)

Figure 1: Future SDR value network
With the introduction of the SDR technology the radio chipset vendors will become responsible for integration of
complete radio computers. They may use separate manufacturing companies (semiconductor foundries) and integrate
also IP blocks from other semiconductor vendors e.g. outer modem HW accelerators. Such radio computers, which may
include some built-in radio applications, are provided as radio platforms to mobile device manufacturers. Mobile device
manufacturers develop their consumer products, like mobile phones, multimedia computers and PDA devices, which
use the radio computers as subsystems for communications purposes. Mobile device manufacturer may also choose to
implement itself some radio applications into the radio computer platform. While radios continue to be used for
multiple different purposes and new radio technologies continue to emerge development of radio applications as
software entities may become a business of itself. Such radio application providers may develop and market their radio
applications to multiple radio computer vendors and mobile device manufacturers. This kind of value network may also
allow some software companies to become radio software tool vendors having multiple radio developer companies as
their customers.
From the regulatory point of view the mobile device manufacturer remains responsible of all radio equipment
functionality embedded into its consumer market product.
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9 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)
4.1 Architecture requirements
The SDR reference architecture for mobile devices needs to cover radio functionalities from antenna interface up to the
networking interface.
The SDR reference architecture needs to follow modern design principles, such as model driven and component-based
design practices in order to end up into a modular architecture, which can support integration of radio application
software from different providers. Also portability of radio applications from one SDR platform to another is to be seen
as important design criteria.
The SDR platform is designed as multiradio computer platform, which may be composed of one or more general
purpose control processor(s) and of one or more specialized co-processors (e.g. digital signal processor clusters, vector
processors etc). This kind of heterogeneous multi-processor architecture operates under tight real-time constraints (in
µsec range) and is bound by a tight power budget. Dynamic reconfiguration of the hardware platform also needs to be
supported by the architecture. How to provide secure execution environment for all radio applications running on a
common radio computer platform is also an important design criteria.
4.2 Operational requirements
The SDR radio applications will operate on multiple frequency bands (e.g. from 400 MHz to 10 GHz) and use multiple
bandwidths (e.g. from 200 KHz to 500 MHz). They also cover multiple radio technologies, including existing cellular
access and non-cellular radio technologies as well as new ones which are likely to emerge with the introduction of
cognitive radio systems. The radio applications in the SDR equipments will continue to conform to their specific radio
interface specifications and standards.
Both connectivity radios (for user data transfer) and other types of radios, such as digital media broadcasting,
geopositioning and wireless sensing radios need to be supported by the common SDR reference architecture.
SDR equipment may execute radios on both licensed and unlicensed frequency bands.
4.3 Capability requirements
Multiradio configuration capability: SDR equipment in mobile device is expected to install, load and activate a radio
application while running a set of radio systems already. Correspondingly it allows active radio systems to become
deactivated, unloaded and uninstalled.
Multiradio operation capability: SDR equipment in mobile device is expected to execute number of radio systems
simultaneously by taking into account temporal coexistence rules designed for their common operation to mitigate
inter-radio interference.
Multiradio resource sharing capability: SDR equipment in mobile device is expected to execute number of radio
systems simultaneously by sharing computation, memory, communications and RF circuitry resources available on the
radio computer platform by using appropriate resource allocation, binding and scheduling mechanisms.
4.4 Interface requirements
The interfaces in the SDR reference architecture are defined in order to support the requirements defined in clauses 4.1
to 4.3. Especially those interfaces which can enable business boundaries between different stakeholders need to be
identified in the reference architecture.
First of all the SDR equipment will provide a service interface to its user entities representing the network protocol
stack (e.g. TCP/IP) and other user domain entities in the mobile device. Such a Multiradio access interface provides a
uniform way to access all radio applications in the SDR equipment.
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10 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)
Another important system-wide interface needs to be specified at the boundary between the common radio computer
platform and the specific radio applications. This Unified radio application interface is used to adapt and align all
kinds of radio applications under the common reconfiguration, multiradio execution and resource sharing framework of
the SDR reference architecture.
One of the key objectives of the SDR reference architecture is to allow uniform production of radio applications as
software entities. This can be achieved by introducing as part of the architecture a Radio programming interface. This
is both a radio software development time concept as well as a run-time interface between radio software entities and
the radio computer platform. This interface needs to include a uniform radio programming model that combines
required run-time dynamism with real-time guarantees and efficiency. The programming model needs to be platform
neutral and allow multiple radio compilers to be used for generating run-time radio packages for different platforms
from the same source program. Additional aspects to be taken into account in the radio programming interface are
virtualization of hardware peripherals of the radio computer such as reconfigurable RF devices.
Due to the foundational role of RF circuitry in any radio equipment the SDR reference architecture may benefit a lot
from the ongoing technical evolution in the RF circuit design area. We anticipate the emergence of a more generic
reconfigurable RF interface, which will support multiple radio applications and may even support sharing of the same
circuitry among simultaneously active radio applications with similar enough RF properties.
4.5 Other requirements
Besides the architectural and technological requirements discussed above the SDR equipments will bring new kinds of
usage scenarios, which are likely to require additional mechanisms to become accepted in mass markets. The
conformance of all radios and their combinations on the same platform will still fulfil the EMR and other product safety
regulations. The conformance testing of SDR equipments may require additional measures, which need to be
investigated also.
The introduction of computerized SDR equipments is bringing programmability of mobile devices into a new level,
which needs to be accompanied with appropriate mechanisms to ensure authentication and secure operation of installed
radio applications on every SDR platform.
5 SDR reference architecture for mobile device
5.1 Operating environment
SDR equipments will operate in the same kinds of networking environments as today's mobile phones, PDAs and
laptops. Both licensed and unlicensed frequency bands will remain in use. SDR equipments will be used in user
terminals in operators' networks as well as peer equipments in short range, personal and ad hoc networks. Radio and TV
broadcasting stations and geopositioning satellites will also be used as distant communication peers of SDR
equipments.
Besides existing radio technologies new radio technologies and frequency bands will become available to SDR
equipments. Therefore the design of SDR equipment architecture will be prepared for new frequency bands and radio
systems - among them especially the ones supporting introduction of cognitive radio systems. More flexible schemes to
use available radio frequencies will also emerge by introduction of spectrum sensing techniques, distribution of
cognitive control information and use of commonly agreed spectrum etiquettes. From the SDR equipment architecture
point of view both network-centric control schemes and autonomously operating mobile devices are equally valid in
such future spectrum utilization cases.
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11 ETSI TR 102 680 V1.1.1 (2009-03)

Figure 2: Operating environment of SDR mobile devices
Figure 2 illustrates the common communication cases for SDR mobile devices and can be used to fix the meaning for
the following key actors present in SDR operating environment:
SDR Equipment includes those parts (subsystems) of a mobile device, which operate many - if not all - radio
technologies needed to satisfy user's communication needs. Therefore SDR Equipment is considered to be a multiradio
equipment and it is the primary interest of the reference architecture presented in the present document.
Peer (Communication) Equipment is any communication counterpart of a SDR Equipment. It can be reached by
establishing a (logical) communications link (later on referred to as an association) between SDR Equipment and Peer
Equipment. Examples of Peer Equipments are WLAN access points, IP access nodes (GGSN etc) in cellular networks,
Bluetooth headsets, digital radio and TV broadcasting stations, GPS satellites etc.
Sometimes it may be necessary to distinguish between the Peer Radio Equipment (e.g. a cellular base station) and the
Peer Communication Equipment (IP Access Node or GGSN in cellular network). Otherwise in the present document
Peer Equipment means always a Peer Communication Equipment. As illustrated in figure 2 Peer Radio Equipments are
connected with radio links and Peer Communication Equipments are connected over (logical) communications links.
5.2 Radio Computer Concept
Traditionally a radio subsystem in mobile phones and laptops has been regarded as voice telephony and data modem
equipment. It has been developed as an embedded system consisting of customer logic (ASIC) components for RF and
DSP processors for baseband signal processing plus protocol and control software running on a microprocessor. Recent
development with advanced radio technologies (WCDMA and OFDM) has led the radio designers to look for more
programmable platforms like Application-Specific Instruction set Processors (ASIP), Single-Instruction-Multiple Data
(SIMD) processors as well as multicore and multiprocessor systems. Typically such architectures also need the support
of some ASIC accelerators for most common signal processing functions especially due to power consumption reasons.
Instead of engineering radios as embedded systems on RFICs, special-purpose digital signal processors and A
...