Enhancing Multimedia Traffic Performance in IEEE 802.11e Networks

IEEE 802.11e constitutes the “state of the art” standard for providing QoS to multimedia traffic in Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs). However, it has been proven inadequate in certain network conditions (high load). Several mechanisms improving its performance have been proposed in the past years. Most of them focused on altering the static nature of resource allocation specified in IEEE 802.11e. Nevertheless, it is of high importance to consider the traffic characteristics before doing so. In this paper, a new, centralized and simple algorithm is proposed that considers multimedia traffic characteristics and adequately copes with high load situations in wireless infrastructure networks. The proposed algorithm is evaluated and its effectiveness is proven by means of simulation.