To meet exploding bandwidth demand, mobile operators are upgrading backhaul networks to packet-based technology. This transition brings a major challenge: maintaining synchronization, a mandatory requirement for mobile network stability and handset handoff. As Ethernet is an asynchronous technology, newer methods and standards have been introduced to implement synchronization over Ethernet. Namely, IEEE 1588v2 PTP is becoming the choice solution for synchronization distribution, as it uses an exchange of timestamp between master and slave devices, thus providing frequency, phase and time sync over the existing Ethernet infrastructure.
This paper proposes a deployment strategy for operators and carriers interested in PTP. More specifically, it presents the five deployment phases that lead to a fully functional and stable PTP-based synchronization network: network survey for real-world metric measurement; benchmarking of various solutions to identify the best one; configuration and turn-up of PTP pipes; synchronization performance monitoring; and troubleshooting of PTP and synchronization-related events.