EVALUATION OF GSM NETWORK QUALITY OF SERVICE USING HANDOVER SUCCESS RATE AS PERFORMANCE MATRICES

Abstract

Wireless cellular communication systems have experienced a positive transformation over
the past decades. Today there is a global change in the use and operations rendered by
cellular networks. Cellular phones not only enables receive and call from almost anywhere
worldwide, but also facilitates other business services that are very much vital to society.
Handover process is considered as the procedure that takes current call from one cell to
another as the demand (user) moves through the coverage area of a cellular system. Better-
quality Cellular network performance is achieved if an efficient handover prioritizing
structures are put in place when a user is moving between the cells. As the number of
subscribers of GSM in Nigeria increases, the demand for good QoS has become a matter of
concern in the country. In finding a lasting solution to the problem, the Nigerian
Communication Commission (NCC), the body responsible for the regulation of
Telecommunications sector in Nigeria, issued out the threshold levels on the key
performance indicators (KPIs) for ascertaining QoS of all the GSM networks in the country.
In this paper we try evaluating, analyzing the QoS of MTN GSM network in four
topographical areas of Kaduna State (Kaduna south, Kaduna North, Zaria and Kafanchan),
Nigeria using Handover Success Rate (HOSR) as performance matrices. The data collated
from the management center of MTN network was used for the evaluation of the measured
KPI parameters using the data management tool.