Agilent Technologies has announced support for 1xEV-DO enhanced high-rate packet data (eHRPD) in its 8960 wireless communication test sets running the E6706C lab application software.

This package is designed to support test and verification of the interaction of eHRPD designs with existing 1xEV-DO and future LTE designs.

To prepare wireless networks for interoperability with future LTE implementations, the 3GPP2 standards committee developed eHRPD as a new version of the 1xEV-DO upper-layer protocol stack. The modified stack provides upper-layer protocols compatible with the 3GPP Evolved Packet Core (EPC). This capability will eventually drive handovers between LTE and 1xEV-DO.

For wireless developers, Agilent’s E6706C software provides network emulation and test tools for mobile device design, integration and validation. The eHRPD functionality builds on the existing 1xEV-DO packet data foundation, which includes full-throughput multiflow packet application (MFPA), enhanced multiflow packet application (EMPA) and robust header compression (RoHC).