Experimental Tuning of the AIFSN Parameter to Prioritize Voice over Data Transmission in 802.11E WLAN Networks

In this paper we experimentally study the impact of one EDCA parameter, namely AIFSN on a mixed voice/data wireless transmission. In particular we investigate how the tuning of this parameter affects both the voice transmission quality and background data throughput. We predict end-to-end voice transmission quality from time varying transmission impairments using the latest Appendix to the ITU-T E-model. Our experimental results show that the tuning of the AIFSN parameter can successfully prioritize voice transmission over data in a real 802.11e network. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first experimental investigation on tuning of MAC layer parameters in a real 802.11e WLAN network and its effect on end-to-end voice transmission quality.

[1]  Mark Davis,et al.  Experimental investigation on VoIP performance and the resource utilization in 802.11b WLANs , 2006, Proceedings. 2006 31st IEEE Conference on Local Computer Networks.

[2]  Miroslaw Narbutt.  The E-model Based Quality Contours for Predicting Speech Transmission Quality and User Satisfaction From Time-Varying Transmission Impairments , 2007 .

[3]  Henning Schulzrinne,et al.  Adaptive playout mechanisms for packetized audio applications in wide-area networks , 1994, Proceedings of INFOCOM '94 Conference on Computer Communications.

[4]  Mark Davis,et al.  Assessing the Quality of VoIP Transmission Affected by Playout Buffer Scheme , 2005 .

[5]  Liam Murphy,et al.  Adaptive VoIP playout scheduling: assessing user satisfaction , 2005, IEEE Internet Computing.

[6]  Ilenia Tinnirello,et al.  Understanding 802.11e contention-based prioritization mechanisms and their coexistence with legacy 802.11 stations , 2005, IEEE Network.

[7]  Mark Davis,et al.  Gauging VoIP call quality from 802.11 WLAN resource usage , 2006, 2006 International Symposium on a World of Wireless, Mobile and Multimedia Networks(WoWMoM'06).

[8]  Mark Davis,et al.  An assessment of the audio codec performance in voice over WLAN (VoWLAN) systems , 2005, The Second Annual International Conference on Mobile and Ubiquitous Systems: Networking and Services.

[9]  Sachin Garg,et al.  An experimental study of throughput for UDP and VoIP traffic in IEEE 802.11b networks , 2003, 2003 IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking, 2003. WCNC 2003..