K18

High performance passive monitoring probe for the NSA System

Your Challenges

The exponential growth in network complexity and increased interworking of different legacy and next generation technologies makes accurate and reliable data correlation essential for effective and fast 4G and 3G network troubleshooting. Operators need to be able to correlate and analyze high load data from different interfaces and different technologies in the shortest possible time to identify network and service issues that may cause performance degradation. Reliable monitoring platforms that can test legacy and emerging technologies are needed to ensure that all issues are identified before roll out, minimize time to resolution, reduce cost of test infrastructure and increase the productivity of test teams. Today’s explosion of mobile broadband-based data traffic and the evolution towards an all-IP architecture also makes it essential to capture high data rates without data loss.

How We Can Help

K18 RAN and core probes provide a flexible and scalable network monitoring solution that addresses a wide range of technologies at an economical cost. Different versions of K18 probes are available for a wide range of physical interfaces: STM-1/OC-3 (including channelized STM-1), E1/DS1/J1, and Fast/Gigabit Ethernet. In combination with Network & Service Analyzer (NSA) applications, K18 probes enable operators and network equipment manufacturers to address all stages of technology development, from feature and system test in the labs to live network 3G and 4G troubleshooting and performance optimization. K18 RAN and core probes feed the NSA system with captured traffic in a stream-store-analyze mode to ensure that data integrity cannot be compromised. Data processing is offloaded to an external personal computer or server to keep data acquisition costs low while delivering performance scalability.

Features and Benefits

  • Auto-configuration of inverse multiplexing for ATM (IMA) groups provides a significant reduction in test session configuration and set-up time
  • 100% line rate, state of the art hardware filters deliver a drastic reduction in data processing time, reducing the time required for performance analysis and problem resolution
  • Distributed monitoring architecture makes it possible to test physically or geographically separated but interconnected sites. Calls can be monitored end-to-end over multiple interfaces regardless of the location of network elements. This architecture makes it possible to collect KPIs from all interfaces and drill-down to individual calls if needed.

Applications

  • Campaign-based live network monitoring
  • Performance monitoring and optimization

Campaign-Based Live Network Monitoring

K18 RAN and core probes provide a fast and targeted deployment of dedicated test units to isolate root causes of quality degradation or to carry out QoS surveys. For example, an operator may need to perform networking monitoring at the Radio Network Controller (RNC) level for a defined amount of time. Or it might require an ad hoc campaign to identify the root cause of issues highlighted by VIP users in a specific area. Once the problem is identified and resolved, the probes are no longer needed and can be deployed for another campaign. Operators can work on specific issues by going deep into details of behavior at the edge of the network. They can measure parameters that are not addressed by OSS counters and interfaces such as Iub that are not monitored by network-wide systems because of deployment timing, budget constraints or scaling requirements. The ability to isolate and resolve performance issues enables faster time to market in the rollout phase and shorter time to ticket resolution for live networks. K18 probes help field technicians identify root causes in less time and meet their effectiveness goals and they help managers and directors meet their efficiency and QoS targets.

Performance Monitoring And Optimization

As an element of the NSA/OptiMon system, K18 probes provide RAN interface monitoring and data capturing for advanced analysis and optimization of RAN performance. RAN performance optimization helps increase the QoS provided to subscribers and significantly decreases the overall cost of operations. test drive campaigns, this approach has reduced operating costs by up to 60%. In some cases, new network elements are no longer needed after RAN performance optimization. In Field technicians will be able to diagnose problems that would have otherwise been difficult or impossible to find with drive test or RNC traces and directors of optimization will be able to meet their business targets.

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