File size-based small cell connection in Phantom Cell Concept energy savings schemes

Energy savings schemes, in which unused small cells are put into a low power sleep mode, are an efficient way to reduce the energy consumption in Phantom Cell Concept (PCC) systems. Existing energy savings schemes, in which a user equipment (UE) is connected to a small cell whenever it needs to receive data, yield a significant amount of energy savings. To further reduce the energy consumption of PCC systems, we introduce in this paper two methods making a user connect or not to a small cell, based on the size of arriving files. Performance results show that using the size of the file to be received as an additional cell selection parameter can yield a further 5% energy savings in certain conditions, at minimal cost to user quality of service (QoS), with respect to the amount of energy savings obtained with existing schemes.