EDX Area studies use a Transmitter/Base/Hub/Router Site at one end, and mobile/remote units placed at uniform distances along radials extending out from the center of the transmitter. The study is then enclosed by a Study Grid, which is used to display and control the size of the resulting study. Area Studies can be used to create maps showing coverage areas, interference areas, and other information that can be directly used to design a communications system and predict its performance in terms of real service objectives.

Selecting Studies>Area Studies will bring up the following dialog box, which has a layout similar to the Multipoint Studies and Route Studies dialog box.

Calculate/Status Bar/Group/Name/Transmitter Group/Rx ID

For each study listed in this window, you’ll see the 6 columns listed in the title of this section. The Calculate column checkbox toggles whether that particular study will be calculated on the next Area Study run. Selecting the Status Bar column checkbox determines which study will be shown in the Status Bar of the main map window. Only one study can be shown in the Status Bar at a time. The Name column shows the particular study chosen. The last two columns show on which Transmitter Group and mobile/remote unit (Rx Id) the study will be run. For more information and details on groups and grouping, see Transmitter/Base/Hub/Router Sites.

The Label field allows you enter a unique identifier for each study listed. This can be useful if you’re running the same study on different groups. For example, if you set up and run 4 Received power at remote studies, you’ll see Received power at remote listed 4 times in the Map Layers list. You won’t know which one is which at the moment. Giving each study their own label makes it easier to identify them in the Map Layers list.

Using this Area Studies list, you can create up to 20 Area Studies per Map View to meet the needs of the communication system analysis. The studies can show different signal quantities for the same system (received power and C/(I+N) ratio for example), or show the same quantity for different systems that are selected using transmitter groups described in Chapter 8, RF Systems Menu.

Add Study

Clicking the Add Study button in the Area Studies for Map View dialog box brings up the Area Study Details dialog box, shown below, where you can set up a new area study so it will be added to the dialog box list. 

Appendix F describes in detail the methods used for each Study Name.

Study Group/Study Name

This is where you select the study you want to set-up and run. Clicking the Study Name drop-down list allows you to see the full list of area studies that are available in your product. Notice that the default Study Group is set to Basic. This is the group of studies that are available in the basic EDX software products (Signal and SignalPro). If you have SignalPro with any of the add-on modules such as WiMAX or Mobile/Cellular, clicking on the Study Group drop-down list will show additional study groups, like WiMAX or Mobile/Cellular. Selecting one of these other groups, then browsing the Study Name drop-down list will show additional studies available through that module.

Primary Transmitter Group/Secondary Transmitter Group

As mentioned in the Multipoint and Route Studies, you can sort your transmitters into groups. This is where you pick the group on which to run your study. If you haven’t sorted your transmitters into groups, then by default the study will run on the master group, and will include all transmitters marked as active in the group. Normally only the primary group is set and considered in the study. However, there are studies like the C/I ratio Primary Group TX’s to Secondary Group TX’s that need two groups in order to run the study.

Study Display Style

Clicking the Study Display Style button brings up the Area Study Style dialog box where you can set how the study will look on the main map.

Study Display type

The selections from this drop-down list affect how the study will be displayed on the screen. The choices are:

• Composite Grid – Signals between two levels share the same color.

• Color Gradient – Signals between two levels change color from one level to the other.

• Composite Contours – displays colored outlines of levels like terrain contours on a topographic map.

• 3D Composite – Signal levels can be extracted in 3D.

• Grid Over Terrain – Study grid display is draped over the terrain in 3D.

• Radial Lines – Study results are displayed only on the radials used for the study.

Not all Area Studies support all the Study display type choices. The most common display types are the composite grid, which give you clear visual breakpoints between levels. The other is grid over terrain, which when used with Show distinct grid lines and the azimuth/elevation controls located in the Current View Setup dialog box (Map>Current Map View), can give you a good representation of how your signal is interacting with terrain.

Set Signal/Color Levels

The Set signal/color levels button brings up the following dialog box where you can set the number of levels you want to see in your study. Depending on which Study Name was selected in the previous dialog box, the number and type of Set signal/color levels options displayed will vary, and may be limited. For example, selecting the Shadow map study bring up a dialog box where you can only have two levels: LOS and Shadowed. 

Selecting a Received power at remote study brings up a dialog that allows you to set up to 10 different levels. Type in the number of levels you want and hit tab to exit the field and set the new levels. Set the color for a level by clicking the Color box for that level. 

Clicking the Symbol drop-down list allows you set a different symbol to be painted on the screen. However, leaving it the solid color is usually the best option for study clarity. At the bottom of the Symbol drop-down list is a (blank) NO_SYMBOL choice, which can be useful in certain circumstances. For example, you’re running an RSSI study where all you care about is signal above a certain threshold, like -90dBm. You can’t have less than two levels, so normally you’d be stuck with color in the display below the threshold in which you’re interested. However, selecting the NO_SYMBOL for the results below your threshold will effectively remove them from the final display. You’ll still see the results in the status bar, but not on the screen.

The Values column is where you type the numbers that represent the edges of the ranges you’re interested in showing. 

The Description column allows you to add notes for each level that can be displayed in the legend window next to the signal level.

Set color theme as default

EDX software has defaults color settings for all the studies that return a colored display for the result. Clicking this button will overwrite the EDX defaults color scheme for this study name with what you’ve set for this study. It won’t override the colors of existing studies, but will apply to any new study you add. You can also change the defaults manually. For more information, see the Study Preferences.

Supplemental Area Study Style Settings

For studies that use contours or FCC contours for display, you can set the line widths and other parameters for those types of display.

Show Distinct Grid Line/Display Grid Lines

This selection is used with the grid over terrain and gradient over terrain Study display types. It shows the lines between the grid points in the study grid. The slider controls how dark those lines will be. Start with a quarter to a half down, and see how you like the results. The display checkbox with then only show the grid lines where there is signal level above the signal level display threshold in the main area study details dialog box.

Calculation Method

Returning to the Area Study Details dialog box, the next item is the Calculation method section. Normally area studies are done using the Radial Line calculation method. It’s the fastest way to calculate area studies in EDX software. The program starts at the Start Azimuth radial specified in the parameters under Study sector/Sector range found in the Transmitter/Base/Hub/Router Site Details dialog box. The study points are calculated along that radial based on the value of the Study point spacing on radials entry. When the program reaches the end distance (Study radius) specified, it moves to the next radial (based on the Azimuth increment value) and continues until it’s completed all radials (Stop Azimuth). The program does this for every active transmitter in the group specified for the study. These results are stored in a number of work files in the project directory.

Once the study has completed, the program then finds the coordinates for the center of each bin in the study grid, finds the 4 closest points in the work files, then paints the bin the appropriate signal level and color based on an interpolation of those 4 points.

The Direct To Grid method just calculates the center of each bin in the study grid, then accesses the terrain/clutter, etc. files directly and performs the calculations at each bin point, instead of along the radials. Direct To Grid is necessary when using 2D and 3D ray-tracing propagation models to find the edges of walls and buildings. It can be used with standard propagation models and studies, but increases the study time by orders of magnitude. For example, a study that might take 20 minutes to run would take a couple of hours with Direct To Grid.

Uplink Calculation

For studies that use uplink path loss data, the user has the option of either selecting the downlink path loss data (Use Downlink Path) or having the uplink path loss data calculated separately (Independent Calculation). A separate uplink path loss calculation is recommended when at least one of the sectors in the study group has different receive antenna type or height (AGL) than the transmitter antenna.

Noise and Interference option for C/(I+N) and BER studies

In this section, there is a set of radio buttons that give you the option of choosing which quantities are used in the denominator for most C/(I+N) calculations. For some types of analysis, it is helpful to see C/I (Use Interference only) or C/N (Use noise only) to get a view of the extent to which interference or noise alone is affecting the received signal.

Signal Level Display Threshold

The next item in the Area Study Details dialog is the threshold for the Signal level display threshold. This quantity will limit the area study display based on whether the signal received at the CPE from the base is above or below the threshold. By selecting an appropriate value here, you can suppress the display of any study results where the received signal level is below the entered threshold value. 

See Appendix F to understand exactly how this value is used in calculating and displaying a study.

Reliability Method

The Reliability Method drop-down list allows you to choose the method that calculates reliability (or availability) for the studies. The parameters and settings for the chosen method are set under  Studies>Reliability Methods. To make informed selections using this drop-down list, you should first review Appendix H, which describes in detail the ramifications of each selection..

Uplink Interference Studies

The Uplink Interference Studies section has several settings that affect many of the studies which use uplink (remote to base) interference calculations. The Maximum Number of Interfering Sectors field limits the number of other transmitters that will be considered as interferers. The Interference Sources options allow you to include remote/mobile units as interferers and/or include interference from other base transmitters. 

Use Single Polygon Filter on Study

This allows you to restrict the study display to an area bounded by a single polygon. It can use “.bna”, “.KML”, “.mif” and “.shp” files.

Mobile/Remote Unit

The Mobile/Remote Unit Id drop-down list lets you specify which unit you want to use for the study. For more details, see Mobile/Remote Unit. You can view and edit the parameters for the selected mobile unit here by selecting one of the units from the drop-down list and then clicking Edit. The Show remote on legend checkbox will show/hide the receive antenna type, height and gain in the legend window when printing.

The View study at...checkbox works in conjunction with the DAS module to show studies that are based on height, such as running studies on the first and second floor. If your second floor was at 20 feet, setting the value of Effective height to view study as 20 would show you the second floor study and not the first floor.

Modify Study

Returning to the Area Studies for Map View main dialog box (Studies>Area Studies), after a study is highlighted in the list, selecting the Modify Study button opens the Area Study Details dialog box to allow study modifications. The fields in this dialog box are the same as those available when selecting the Add Study button.

Delete Study

For any study selected in the list, selecting the Delete Study button deletes the study and corresponding study layer from the map layers. 

Run Studies

Clicking the Run Studies button will start the calculations for all studies in the list that are checked in the Calculate column. You can also run the studies from the main map window by clicking on the Calculate area studies buttonin the toolbar menu. If you click the drop-down arrow just to the right of the button you can access, edit and run each study individually, without having to go back into the main Area Studies for Map View dialog box. Another option is to use the project pane. Expand Map Views>Initial View>Area Studies and right-click on the study you want to run. A contextual menu displays selection options for the study. Choose Run to start the study.

Following this action, a series of dialog boxes will appear. This first dialog box reports the progress of the study as it calculates the signal levels from each hub transmitter to each study point along the radials. When these calculations are done, it will report that it is doing the final composite calculations for the study. If necessary, you can cancel the study operation. However, if you do so, any display results for that study will be removed from the screen until you re-calculate the study. When the route study is completed, the results will appear as colored symbols on your map along the route.

See Appendix F for more information on how Area Studies are done.

Study Export File Types/Create Export File

From the Area Studies for Map View dialog box, you have the option of exporting the study results. In the lower right corner of the dialog box, select the export type from the Study Export File Types window, then click the Create Export File button to start the export process. You can also export area studies from the Map Layers dialog box by selecting the area study you want to export, clicking the Export Layer button in the lower right corner, then choosing the export type from the Export MapLayer dialog box pop up and then clicking the Export Layer button in the dialog pop up.

Exporting Area Studies Using the Vertical Mapper Option

This is a separate option for EDX SignalPro and is installed after SignalPro has been installed. If the Vertical Mapper option is not installed, you will get a message as shown below when attempting to export.

To export a study, choose the Area Study you wish to export and then select the GRC (VerticalMapper) file type. Click Export Layer, then click Create Grid File, and then enter the “save to” file name.