초록 ▼

A method and apparatus for sectorizing coverage of a cellular communications area includes providing a remote unit having microcell antenna units. Each microcell antenna unit is configured to cover a particular sector. The remote unit is connected to a sectorized base station unit which is connected

A method and apparatus for sectorizing coverage of a cellular communications area includes providing a remote unit having microcell antenna units. Each microcell antenna unit is configured to cover a particular sector. The remote unit is connected to a sectorized base station unit which is connected to a mobile telecommunications switching office. Separate digitized streams representative of telephone signals received from the mobile telecommunications switching office are generated corresponding to the microcell antenna units and the separate digitized streams are multiplexed and transmitted to the remote unit. The remote unit demultiplexes the multiplexed digitized streams into the separate digitized streams corresponding to the microcell antenna units and the separate digitized streams are converted to RF signals for coverage of a particular sector by the corresponding microcell antenna unit. Separate digitized streams are separately generated for each microcell antenna unit representative of RF signals received at the microcell antenna unit for a particular sector. The separately generated digitized streams are multiplexed at the remote unit and transmitted to the sectorized base station unit. At the sectorized base station unit, the multiplexed digitized streams are demultiplexed into the separate digitized streams corresponding to microcell antenna units and the separate digitized streams are converted to RF signals for provision to the mobile telecommunications switching office. Diversity at the remote units is also provided.

대표청구항 ▼

[ We claim:] [1.] A method of sectorizing coverage over a cellular communications area divided into a plurality of microcells each covering a subarea of the communications area and being divided into a plurality of angular sectors having separate transmitters and receivers, the method comprising per

[ We claim:] [1.] A method of sectorizing coverage over a cellular communications area divided into a plurality of microcells each covering a subarea of the communications area and being divided into a plurality of angular sectors having separate transmitters and receivers, the method comprising performing the following steps:receiving a number of information-bearing telephone signals from a mobile telecommunications switching office at a common base station serving the microcells within the cellular communications area;modulating the information-bearing telephone signals onto a plurality of different analog radio-frequency carriers representing a plurality of different channel sets for respective sectors of the microcells at the base station;combining the analog radio-frequency signals for all of the sectors into a single outbound analog signal within a predetermined radio-frequency band, representing all of the channel sets for all of the sectors;converting the single outbound analog signal directly to a single outbound digital representation at the base station;sending the outbound digital representation of the radio-frequency signal via a transmission means to a remote unit located in or near the subarea of at least one microcell;at the remote unit, converting the outbound digital representation directly to a single analog representation of the entire outbound single radio-frequency signal within the same radio-frequency band and containing each of the plurality of channel sets;sending each of the plurality of channel sets to a different one of a plurality of antenna units for the microcell, each of the antenna units being positioned so as to cover a different angular sector of the microcell;at the antenna unit covering each sector of the microcell, receiving telephone signals within the radio-frequency band for the channel set of that sector;sending the received telephone signals to the remote unit;at the remote unit, combining all the received telephone signals from all the sectors to a single combined analog radio-frequency received signal containing all the channel sets for the microcell;converting the single combined radio-frequency received signal directly to a received digital representation of the radio-frequency band of the channel sets for the sectors;sending the received digital representation via the transmission means to the base station; andat the centrally located base station, converting the received digital representation directly to a received analog representation;demodulating the received analog representation to recover the individual inbound telephone signals.