Link Quality Improvement of Long-Term Evolution and 802.11ax in High-Density Areas

Abstract

The 802.11ax high-efficiency wireless (HEW) particularly designed for high-density areas. However, dense areas have specific requirements that demand precise deployment strategies by network developers. In dense networks, a large number of users are simultaneously connected to the same channel; hence, the available bandwidth is divided among the users in such a way that joining more users can eventually saturate the network. Furthermore, in dense areas, a large number of closely spaced users are transmitting data at the same time. In such a heavily frequency interfered environment, the wireless link quality extremely degrades, which can practically render the network unavailable. Thereby, it is essential to determine the appropriate deployment options regarding the specific networks’ settings and configurations. Hence, this work proposes a network architecture model to determine the dual-band HEW performance in dense deployments. The model additionally includes long-term evolution (LTE) as the cellular alternative for high-density areas which is utilized by the model as the reference point for corresponding comparison purposes with HEW. The model is implemented, and link quality parameters are measured based on different aspects of the deployment options. To further validate the model and determine the optimization levels provided by the options, the simulation and analytical results are compared.