Macro-Cell Site

A macro-cell site is what most people have come to know or expect to see for
a communication site for all forms of mobile communication systems.With
the advent of personal communications services (PCS), the need for macrocells
was initially portrayed as being an item of the past. However, the need
to provide coverage to compete with existing wireless operators made the
use of macro-cell sites a necessity.
There are multiple configurations associated with each type of technology
platform picked for the communication system. For instance AMPS,
TACS, GSM, CDMA, NADC (IS-136), and iDEN, to mention a few, can all be
configured either as an omni-, bi-directional, or three-sector cell depending
on the application at hand.
For the design engineer, the decision of using a macro-cell is driven by
multiple reasons. However, there are a few different perturbations with
regards to cell sites that need lead to interesting designs. As is often the
case in real life, in the city, the amount of green-field locations is not large
and in fact, the desire to utilize an existing communication site is receiving
much pressure. There are a multitude of reasons why an existing communication
site should be used and also why it should not be used.
The reasons for utilizing an existing communication site leads to the
issue of community affairs in that there is a strong public awareness of
mobile phone systems and the need to limit the amount of towers or any
new communication site that are in a community.
There are several types of macro-cell sites that a design engineer considers
for possible use depending on the design objectives. The types of
macro-cell sites can be classified as either an omni-directional site or a
directional site. The omni-cell sites have a coverage pattern of 360 degrees
in the horizontal plane while directional sites usually comprise three sectors
each covering 120 degrees of the horizontal plane.