Rate Adaptation in IEEE 802.11 Wireless Networks

Abstract

The IEEE 802.11b, which is also known as Wi-Fi, is one of the most popular data transmission standards from the IEEE 802.11. The Wi-Fi provides the low cost solutions of wireless network problems. That is why it is so popular all over the world. Rate adaptation is the process through which we can send data from the host node to the destination node with the maximum throughput in which nodes adapt the data rate dynamically according to the varying channel conditions. But this is not so easy to judge when to adapt the data rate and which one to adapt data rate to get the maximum throughput. In the first generation rate adaptation algorithms, Auto Rate Fallback (ARF) is the most popular and widely used method in the industry. The main drawback of ARF is that it is not able to sustain in the both conditions i.e. the stable channel conditions and the unstable channel conditions. If somehow we can remove these obstacles, then the algorithm will perform in a better way in terms of stabilization. In this work, a solution is proposed, for the stables channel conditions, to get the better results. ARF followed the sequential increment in the data rates after the fixed number of successful transmissions. The proposed modification in the algorithm provides the better and quicker stabilization. An attempt is made for the betterment and received the better/improved results as compared to standard Auto Rate Fallback Algorithm with the reduced time complexity.