UNIVERSITI TENAGA NASIONAL

Department of Electronics & Communication Engineering

College of Graduate Studies
Advanced Communication Engineering
CSEM623

Assignment 5 - OFDM

1)Name

: Joel Jesawanth A/L Jesawanth Singh

2)Student ID
3)Lecturer

: SL22213
: Dr.CHANDAN KUMAR CHAKRABARTY

4) Due Date

: 27th August 2015

a) How is 8 QAM modulation different from 8 PSK? Explain using block diagram.

Figure1: 8-PSK Modulator

The bit rate in each of the three channels is fb/3. The bits in the I and C channels enter the I
channel 2-to-4-level converter and the bits in the Q and C channels enter the Q channel 2-to-4level converter. Essentially, the 2-to-4-level converters are parallel-input digital-to-analog
converter, (DACs). With two input bits, four output voltages are possible. The I or Q bit
determines the polarity of the output analog signal (logic 1=+V and logic 0 = -V), whereas the C
or C bit determines the magnitude (logic 1= 1.307 V and logic 0 = 0.541 V)

Figure 2: 8-QAM Modulator

8-QAM is an M-ary encoding technique where M = 8. Unlike 8-PSK, the output signal from an
8-QAM modulator is not a constant-amplitude signal. Figure 2 shows the block diagram of an 8-

QAM transmitter. As you can see, the only difference between the 8-QAM transmitter and
the 8PSK transmitter shown in Figure 1 is the omission of the inverter between the C
channel and the Q product modulator. As with 8-PSK, the incoming data are divided into
groups of three bits (tribits): the I, Q, and C bit streams, each with a bit rate equal to one-third of
the incoming data rate. Again, the I and Q bits determine the polarity of the PAM signal at the
output of the 2-to-4-level converters, and the C channel determines the magnitude. Because the C
bit is fed un-inverted to both the I and the Q channel 2-to-4-level converters. the magnitudes of
the I and Q PAM signals are always equal. Their polarities depend on the logic condition of the I
and Q bits and, therefore, may be different. Figure 2-30b shows the truth table for the I and Q
channel 2-to-4-level converters; they are identical.

c) How is the error in the modulation affects the bit error rate for 8 QAM and 8 OSK?

BER is an empirical (historical) record of a system's actual bit error performance. For example, if
a system has a BER of 10-5, this means that in past performance there was one bit error for every
100,000 bits transmitted. The bit error performance is related to the distance between points on a
signal state-space diagram. 8QAM may be used when data-rates beyond those offered by 8-PSK
are required by a radio communications system. This is because QAM achieves a greater
distance between adjacent points in the I-Q plane by distributing the points more evenly. And in
this way the points on the constellation are more distinct and data errors are reduced. While it is
possible to transmit more bits per symbol, if the energy of the constellation is to remain the same,
the points on the constellation must be closer together and the transmission becomes more
susceptible to noise. This results in a higher bit error rate than for the lower order QAM variants.
In this way there is a balance between obtaining the higher data rates and maintaining an
acceptable bit error rate for any radio communications system.
QAM outperforms PSK. This is because the distance between signaling points in a PSK system
is smaller than the distance between points in a comparable QAM system.

Figure3: Error rates of QAM modulation systems

For 8-PSK The higher the level of modulation, the smaller the angular separation between signal
points and the smaller the error distance.

Figure 4: Error rates of PSK modulation systems

d) Explain how modulation technology be it PSK or QAM is used in OFDM?

The use of Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) technology in the newer
WLAN technologies promises a much improved and higher data rate and with further
improvements, higher data rates can be achieved. The use of OFDM in LTE offers peak data
rates of 100 Mbps for the cellular purposes. The use of OFDM in LTE has provided a complete
convergence of cellular technology, multimedia applications such as video and high quality audio
and high speed internet. Thus OFDM has a strong capability of taking over other technologies
for the enhancements in mobile and wireless technology for the 4th generation (4G) systems.
There are many modulation techniques used in OFDM like BPSK, QPSK or some form of QAM.
In BPSK, each data symbol modulates the phase of a higher frequency carrier. An important
modulation scheme used in OFDM is QAM. QAM stands for Quadrature Amplitude Modulation.
OFDM tolerates environments with high RF interference. Some services that use OFDM such as
WLAN operate in the unregulated ISM (Industrial Scientific Medical) bands, where they must
co-exist with many unregulated devices, including analog cordless phones (900MHz),
microwave ovens (2.45GHz), Bluetooth devices (2.45GHz), digital cordless phones (2.45GHz or
5.8GHz) and Wireless LAN (2.45GHz or 5.8GHz).
WLAN is defined by the IEEE 802.11 standard, of which there are several variations. The packet
structure is Preamble Header Data Block, and the sub-carrier modulation types are BPSK,
QPSK, 16-QAM, or 64-QAM.
WiMAX, or the Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access, is very similar in concept to
802.11, but the demands of multiple simultaneous users make the implementation much more
complex. Mobile WiMAX is a dynamic system. The amount of data transferred is a function of
the modulation type and symbol rate on each set of sub-carriers. If the link quality is good, a high
throughput modulation type such as QAM is used, and most of the bandwidth is consumed. thus
limiting the number of users on the system. As the user moves further away from the base
station, the signal quality decreases, and with it the ability to maintain a high throughput. A lower
throughput modulation scheme such as QPSK would then be employed. This, of course, does not
require a large group of sub-carriers, so the system can support more users. Figure 5 shows two
WiMAX measurements that the Keithley Model 2820 can perform. We can see a packet structure
containing downlink and uplink data, DL and UL, each separated by a transition gap. The UL
contains more data and would use a complex modulation format such as QAM. This is what we
have chosen to demodulate, although we could also demodulate the DL portion, which is QPSK.
We can even demodulate both and display a hybrid of the two modulation types in the
constellation.

Figure 5: In this WiMAX measurement, we see a packet structure containing downlink and
uplink data, DL and UL, each separated by a transition gap. The UL contains more data and
would use a complex modulation format such as QAM. This is what we have chosen to
demodulate, although we could also demodulate the DL portion, which is QPSK. We can even
demodulate both and display a hybrid of the two modulation types in the constellation.

References:
1) J.W. Craig, \A New, Simple and Exact Result for Calculating the Probabil-ity of Error for
Two-Dimensional Signal Constellations," Proceedings IEEE MILCOM'91, Boston, MA, pp.
25.5.1-25.5.5.
2) Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing :Mark Elo, Marketing Director of RF Products,
Keithley Instruments
3) Evaluating the Performance of (OFDM) Transceiver for Image transfer using 16 PSK and 16
QAM Modulation Schemes by Zain ul Abidin Jaffri, Muhammad Tahir, Sundas Rauf .
4) http://www.radio-electronics.com/info/rf-technology-design/quadrature-amplitudemodulation-qam/8qam-16qam-32qam-64qam-128qam-256qam.php