FDMA, TDMA, CDMA

This document on FDMA versus TDMA versus CDMA provides difference

between FDMA, TDMA and CDMA technologies. This page describes
various multiple access techniques to make use of common resources by
multiple users / subscribers.

FDMA- Frequency Division Multiple Access, here entire band of frequencies is

divided into multiple RF channels/carriers. Each carrier is allocated to different
users. 

For example in GSM entire frequency band of 25 MHz is divided into 124 RF
carriers of bandwidth 200 KHz each.
In Satellite applications entire transponder band of 500 MHz is divided into 24
channels each of bandwidth 40MHz (36 MHz useful and 4MHz guard band).

There are two main types of FDMA scheme used in satellite network. SCPC
(Single Channel Per Carrier) and MCPC (multiple channel per carrier). MCPC
uses FDM or TDM as multiplexing scheme.
FDMA Types

• FAMA- Fixed Assignment Multiple Access, here frequencies are pre-

allocated to users/subscribers/VSATs. 

• DAMA- Demand Assignment Multiple Access, here frequencies are

dynamically allocated based on requests.

TDMA

TDMA- Time Division Multiple Access, here entire bandwidth is shared among
different subscribers at fixed predetermined or dynamically assigned time
intervals/slots. For example in GSM each RF carrier is used/shared by 8 users at
different time instants.
TDMA uses TDM multiplexing technique.

CDMA

CDMA-Code Division Multiple Access, here entire bandwidth is shared among

different users by assigning unique codes. For example in CDMA IS-95
standard entire bandwidth of 1.225 MHz is shared by various channels/users
using unique 64 Walsh Codes. In CDMA entire bandwidth is being used by
users all the time and each have their unique codes to recover the data. The
system works based on spread spectrum concept.

Multiple access schemes are used to allow many mobile users to share simultaneously a
finite amount of radio spectrum.

Multiple Access Techniques

In wireless communication systems, it is often desirable to allow the subscriber to send
information simultaneously from the mobile station to the base station while receiving
information from the base station to the mobile station.

A cellular system divides any given area into cells where a mobile unit in each cell
communicates with a base station. The main aim in the cellular system design is to be able
to increase the capacity of the channel, i.e., to handle as many calls as possible in a given
bandwidth with a sufficient level of quality of service.

There are several different ways to allow access to the channel. These include
mainly the following −

 Frequency division multiple-access (FDMA)

 Time division multiple-access (TDMA)

 Code division multiple-access (CDMA)

 Space division multiple access (SDMA)

Depending on how the available bandwidth is allocated to the users, these

techniques can be classified as narrowband and wideband systems.
Narrowband Systems
Systems operating with channels substantially narrower than the coherence
bandwidth are called as Narrow band systems. Narrow band TDMA allows
users to use the same channel but allocates a unique time slot to each user on
the channel, thus separating a small number of users in time on a single
channel.
Wideband Systems
In wideband systems, the transmission bandwidth of a single channel is much
larger than the coherence bandwidth of the channel. Thus, multipath fading
doesn’t greatly affect the received signal within a wideband channel, and
frequency selective fades occur only in a small fraction of the signal
bandwidth.
Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA)
FDMA is the basic technology for advanced mobile phone services. The
features of FDMA are as follows.

 FDMA allots a different sub-band of frequency to each different user to

access the network.
 If FDMA is not in use, the channel is left idle instead of allotting to the
other users.

 FDMA is implemented in Narrowband systems and it is less complex

than TDMA.
  Tight filtering is done here to reduce adjacent channel interference.

 The base station BS and mobile station MS, transmit and receive
simultaneously and continuously in FDMA.

Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA)

In the cases where continuous transmission is not required, there TDMA is
used instead of FDMA. The features of TDMA include the following.

 TDMA shares a single carrier frequency with several users where each
users makes use of non-overlapping time slots.
 Data transmission in TDMA is not continuous, but occurs in bursts.
Hence hands-off process is simpler.

 TDMA uses different time slots for transmission and reception thus
duplexers are not required.

 TDMA has an advantage that is possible to allocate different numbers of

time slots per frame to different users.

 Bandwidth can be supplied on demand to different users by concatenating

or reassigning time slot based on priority.

Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA)

Code division multiple access technique is an example of multiple access
where several transmitters use a single channel to send information
simultaneously. Its features are as follows.

 In CDMA every user uses the full available spectrum instead of getting
allotted by separate frequency.
 CDMA is much recommended for voice and data communications.

 While multiple codes occupy the same channel in CDMA, the users
having same code (Walsh codes) can communicate with each other.

 CDMA offers more air-space capacity than TDMA.

 The hands-off between base stations is very well handled by CDMA.

Space Division Multiple Access (SDMA)
Space division multiple access or spatial division multiple access is a technique
which is MIMO (multiple-input multiple-output) architecture and used mostly
in wireless and satellite communication. It has the following features.

 All users can communicate at the same time using the same channel.
 SDMA is completely free from interference.

 A single satellite can communicate with more satellites receivers of the

same frequency.

 The directional spot-beam antennas are used and hence the base station in
SDMA, can track a moving user.

 Controls the radiated energy for each user in space.

Spread Spectrum Multiple Access

Spread spectrum multiple access (SSMA) uses signals which have a
transmission bandwidth whose magnitude is greater than the minimum
required RF bandwidth.
There are two main types of spread spectrum multiple access techniques −

 Frequency hopped spread spectrum (FHSS)

 Direct sequence spread spectrum (DSSS)

Frequency Hopped Spread Spectrum (FHSS)

This is a digital multiple access system in which the carrier frequencies of the
individual users are varied in a pseudo random fashion within a wideband
channel. The digital data is broken into uniform sized bursts which are then
transmitted on different carrier frequencies.
Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum (DSSS)
This is the most commonly used technology for CDMA. In DS-SS, the
message signal is multiplied by a Pseudo Random Noise Code. Each user is
given his own code word which is orthogonal to the codes of other users and in
order to detect the user, the receiver must know the code word used by the
transmitter.
The combinational sequences called as hybrid are also used as another type of
spread spectrum. Time hopping is also another type which is rarely
mentioned.
Since many users can share the same spread spectrum bandwidth without
interfering with one another, spread spectrum systems become bandwidth
efficient in a multiple user environment.

CDMA:

Introduction:

This CDMA tutorial describes CDMA basics by explaining PN Sequence

codes, Walsh codes,CDMA Physical layer for Base Station and Mobile
Subscriber. CDMA is the short form of Code Division Multiple Access. It is the
technique by which same frequency and time interval is used by Mobile
subscribers/ Base Stations by way of unique digital codes. There are two main
types of codes used in CDMA, PN sequence codes and walsh codes.
In CDMA Base Station (BTS) to Mobile Subscriber Stations path is called
forward link and Mobile subscriber stations to BTS path is called reverse link.

PN Sequence codes
PN sequence codes are used in reverse link. These codes differentiates various
mobile subscribers at base station as they are unique to all mobile subscribers.
There are access and traffic channels used from mobile to Base station in
CDMA. PN sequence is a sequence of binary numbers which appears to be
random but it is periodic in nature. For example, 3 bit PN sequence is generated
with the LFSR(Linear Feedback Shift Register) shown below.

Say initial output bit pattern is '001' . The same pattern repeats after 2^3-1 or 7
patterns. There are two types of PN sequences used in CDMA, 15 bit pattern
and 42 bit pattern.

PN sequence properties: 1. Difference of number of 0's and 1's always be

equal to 1 in any PN sequence. 
2. Correlation value of any two PN codes is determined by following equation.
(No. of like bits- No. of unlike bits) / (Total no. of bits)
Consider PN sequence of pattern 1110010, If both the patterns are same without
any delay then correlation value is 7-0/7, leads to 1 i.e. maximum value.
For a bit change in this PN codes leads to bit pattern equal to 0111001 and it
will give correlation value of 3-4/7 i.e. -1/7. Hence it is easy to get back the data
of the Mobile/Base station if the PN code is known.
3. For N bit code, there will be N ones or zero runs. 1/2 of run will be of length
1, 1/4 of run will be of length 2, 1/8 of run will be of length 3 and so on.
Walsh codes
Walsh code is called Hadamard Transform. Few of the codes are mentioned
below. Walsh codes are orthogonal to each other, Walsh codes differentiates
each channel on forward link from Base station to Mobile Subscribers. They are
unique for all the channels. There are pilot, sync, paging and traffic channels on
this forward link path. W0 is used for pilot channel, W32 is used for sync
channel, W1 to W7 are used for paging channel and rest of the 64 Walsh codes
are used for traffic channels in IS 95 version of CDMA. There are 256 Walsh
codes in CDMA-2000 version. Following figure is of CDMA Physical layer for
Mobile Subscriber. Walsh code of length n will have n rows of n x n matrix.

For Example W2= [0 0

0 1]

W4=[0 0 0 0
0101
0011
0 1 1 0]
Walsh Codes properties 1. Cross correlation between two different Walsh
codes is not zero; hence it cannot be used if good synchronization is not
available. Instead PN sequence is used. 
2. Walsh codes are orthogonal to each other as mentioned above.

CDMA Physical layer for Mobile Subscriber

Figure depicts all the modules used in CDMA Physical layer, as shown green
modules are not used in access channel path, while the same are used in traffic
channel path.
CDMA Physical layer for Base station

Figure depicts CDMA Physical layer used in CDMA Base station, as shown
various channels follow different physical layer architecture.