Advantages & Disadvantages of TDMA

Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) is a digital cellular telephone communication technology. It facilitates many users to share the same frequency without interference. Its technology divides a signal into different timeslots, and increases the data carrying capacity.

Advantages of TDMA

Here is a list of few notable advantages of TDMA −

·      Permits flexible rates (i.e. several slots can be assigned to a user, for example, each time interval translates 32Kbps, a user is assigned two 64 Kbps slots per frame).

·      Can withstand gusty or variable bit rate traffic. Number of slots allocated to a user can be changed frame by frame (for example, two slots in the frame 1, three slots in the frame 2, one slot in the frame 3, frame 0 of the notches 4, etc.).

No guard band required for the wideband system

Disadvantages of TDMA

The disadvantages of TDMA are as follow −

·      High data rates of broadband systems require complex equalization.

·      Due to the burst mode, a large number of additional bits are required for synchronization and supervision.

·      Call time is needed in each slot to accommodate time to inaccuracies (due to clock instability).

·      Electronics operating at high bit rates increase energy consumption.

·      Complex signal processing is required to synchronize within short slots.