Planning of gap filler networks in satellite DMB systems for wireless multimedia services

Satellite digital multimedia broadcasting (S-DMB) systems use gap fillers (GFs) to provide wireless multimedia services to non-line-of-sight locations. GFs act as repeaters, and S-DMB systems require GF networks in order to guarantee mobile reception. Fach GF covers a cell or sector. In order to provide contiguous coverage of an area comprising two or more cells or sectors, multiple GFs are needed. However, when multiple GFs are situated close to each other, interference is likely to occur. As a result, in this study, we have investigated system-level environments for planning the design of interference-free GF networks in S-DMB systems. Our investigations revealed that S-DMB services are unavailable because of quality deterioration caused by interference when the delay attributable to a GF and the satellite signals exceeds ±256 chips and the distance between the GF and its reception terminal is greater than 4.6 km. On the basis of this analysis, we conducted a field test that confirmed that the above-mentioned time delay can be controlled in such a way as to ensure high quality S-DMB services.