Considerations on link and system throughput of Bluetooth networks

The radio network performance of a large number of Bluetooth piconets is investigated in this contribution. Asynchronous packet data connections are considered exclusively. Continuously transmitting piconets as well as partially loaded piconets with constant average user bit rate (according to a WWW traffic model) are treated. All piconets are located in a single room. It turns out that Bluetooth provides a large capacity for data connections. Under normal load conditions, the link throughput is degraded only marginally by interference. Several hundred simultaneous WWW sessions are feasible in the considered scenario. A maximum aggregate system throughput of about 18 Mbit/s can be obtained. In general, long and uncoded Bluetooth packet types should be preferred for data transmission, since they provide for the largest throughput in most interference conditions.