Measured performance of real time traffic over IEEE 802.11 b/g infrastructured networks

Real time services over wireless local area networks (WLANs) are not always satisfactory; this is mainly due to the unreliability of the wireless medium which could cause both high packet loss rates and delivery jitters. Under these conditions high rate WLANs, such as IEEE 802.11g, could provide worse performance than the slower, but more reliable, IEEE 802.11b. In this paper both unicast and multicast real time transmissions are investigated over IEEE 802.11g and IEEE 802.11b technologies in an indoor scenario, by means of an accurate measurement campaign aimed at deriving the performance experienced. Moreover, the disruptive impact on the perceived qualify of service of the power save functionality of laptops is investigated.