Performance Evaluation of IEEE 802.16 WiMAX Link With Respect to Higher Layer Protocols

The WiMAX technology based on the IEEE802.16-d standard is a broadband wireless access (BWA) technology and considered to be an important ingredient of the composition of the next generation networks (NGN). Till date, due to lack of deployment, not enough data is available in terms of its operational capabilities and efficiencies. The main objective of this paper is to evaluate, analyze and compare the performance of a WiMAX link under different load and traffic conditions. For this purpose an experimental WiMAX test-bed has been deployed at the Communication Network Institute (CNI), University Dortmund and several experiments and stress tests are carried out over this CNI WiMAX test-bed in the uplink and downlink directions for various service and traffic types and at various distances from the base station. The results of these experiments are presented in this paper.