Types of NSA networks
The NSA options include options 3, 3a, and 3x in addition to option 4 and option 7. In the introduction, we took the example of a deployment option known as option 3x. Let us further discuss the main features of this deployment option in detail:
- All control plane signaling is handled by the eNB.
- The eNB is connected to a 4G core for data and signaling.
- There is data plane connectivity between both the gNB and EPC and the eNB and EPC. In this case, both the master nodeB and the EPC are capable of splitting the data traffic between the eNB and gNB.
The other two options of the same flavor are options 3 and 3a, as shown in the following diagrams:
Figure 10.2 – NSA network option 3
The features of option 3 are as follows: