doc.: IEEE 802.

11-00/269

Performance of Smart Antennas

and PCF

Vinayak Nandikal

Courtesy: Nokia Research Center

Submissio
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May 5, 2009 doc.: IEEE 802.11-00/269

Introduction
• IEEE802.11 will be an important method for providing
high rate low mobility data services
• While existing capacity may seem high, particularly
for IEEE802.11a, the enterprise environment may
experience capacity limits
• Antenna technologies offer a means to boast
IEEE802.11 capacity without changing the existing
PHYs

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What is a SMART Antenna?

0 0 2 X D

E D P

G
W S G

G
W S G

G
W S G

G
W S G

STA

AP

STA

Antenna that adjusts its beam pattern based upon the

channel and interference between AP and STA
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Approach to Model Performance

• Measure channel using a channel sounder to
determine
– Multipath power profile as a function of time
– Signal-to-interference ratio
• Simulate PHY to obtain PER information as a
function of channel measurements and the number of
packets delivered as a function of time
• Use PER, number of packets delivered by the PHY
as a function of time and models of real-time traffic to
examine delay and throughput using a PHY with and
without smart antennas
• PCF is used for delivery of audio and video packets
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DOCUMENTTYPE 1 (1)

PHY Simulation Parameters

TypeUnitOrDepartmentHere
TypeYourNameHere TypeDateHere

Parameter Value
Data Rate 12 Mbps/channel
Packet Loss Rate 10-2
Channel Model experimental
Number of Antenna 4
Elements
Adjacent BSS Interference varying
Level
Center Frequency 5.3 GHz

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PHY Channel Sounder Approach

• 127 chip pn sequence is transmitted at 5.3 GHz with
a bandpass bandwidth of 30 MHz
• A 32 element array with 0.5 wavelength space is
used to downconvert the transmitted pn sequence
• Snap shots of the delay spread are written to memory
and stored on a hard disk

For further information see:

Jarmo Kivinen, Timo O. Korhonen, Pauli Aikio, Ralf Gruber,
Pertti Vainikainen, and Sven-Gustav Häggman,
IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement,
vol. 48, no. 1, pp. 39-44, 1999.

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Smart Antenna Operation (5GHz)

H1 [ k ]
Subcarrier
x1 [ k , p ] OFDM Symbol Index
RF A/D FFT N
y[ k , p ] = ∑ w* [ k ] xn [ k , p ]

Antenna Combining
STA H2[k] x2 [ k , p ] n =1
n

RF A/D FFT
Decoding
H N [k]
H1 [ k ] xN [ k , p ]
H2[k] RF A/D FFT Uplink Operation
w[ k ]

HN [k] Weight
STA Calculation

c[ k ]
STA
IFFT D/A RF
Antenna Weighting

IFFT RF H1 [ k ]
D/A
Coding & H2[k] STA
Modulation
H N [k]

IFFT D/A RF Downlink Operation

Submissio Slide 7 Vinayak Nandikal
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Channel Correlation
average over TX positions
1
Ruoholahti  
• The figure to the right 0.99
Heikkiläntie
Airport     
Airport 2   
shows the correlation

amplitude correlation coefficient
0.98

coefficient for different

0.97
measurement
environments 0.96

• For smart antenna 0.95

operation, the AP needs 0.94

the ability to probe the 0.93

0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450
time [ms]
channel between any
STA and AP
Note: Ruholahti and Heikkiläntie are Nokia office buildings

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DOCUMENTTYPE 1 (1)

MAC Simulation Parameters

TypeUnitOrDepartmentHere
TypeYourNameHere TypeDateHere

Parameter Value
Speech Packet Size 640 bits
Video Packet Size 3.8 kb
CFP 1.5 ms
Packet Buffer Lifetime Audio: 5 ms
Video: 100 ms
CFP Repetition Interval 3 ms
Average #of Speech STAs 10/30 users
Average #of Video STAs 10/30 users

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Traffic Model:
• All traffic measured in data-units/slot-time
– 1 data-unit takes 1 slot-time for transmission
– Max traffic in network = 1.0
• Audio and video traffic originates from “calls” made
by the user
• Calls are Poisson distributed; once placed, each call
generates periodic packet traffic
• Mean inter-call-arrival-time controls load on the
network

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Traffic Model (cont.):

• Real-time traffic load =

call _ durn
X
int _ call _ arvl _ time

 apkt _ sz acalls vpkt _ sz vcalls 

 x + x 
 int _ apkt _ arvl _ time acalls + vcalls int _ vpkt _ arvl _ time acalls + vcalls 

apkt_sz: audio packet size

vpkt_sz: video packet size
int_call_arvl_time: mean intercall arrival time (8:1 ratio between audio and video calls)
int_apkt_arvl_time, int_vpkt_arvl_time: arrival time between audio packets and video packets respectively
acalls, vcalls: number of audio anc video calls respectively
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Throughput & Latency Curves:

Audio Packets
­1
10 1
No SDMA       
3­channel SDMA 0.9

0.8

Normalized Througput
­2 0.7
10
PCF Latencies

0.6

0.5

0.4
­3
10
0.3

0.2
DCF:PCF = 1:1  No SDMA       
DCF:PCF =  1:1  0.1 3­channel SDMA
Audio Packets  Audio Packets 
­4
10 0
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5
4
x 10
4 x 10

Packets/Seconds Packets/Second

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Throughput & Latency Curves:

Audio Packets
­1
10 1
No SDMA       
3­channel SDMA 0.9

0.8

Normalized Throughput
­2 0.7
10
0.6
PCF Latencies

0.5

0.4
­3
10
0.3

0.2
DCF:PCF = 1:3  DCF:PCF = 1:3  No SDMA       
0.1 3­channel SDMA
Audio Packets  Aduio Packets 
­4
10 0
0 1 2 3 4 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4
4 4
x 10 x 10

Packets/Seconds Packets/Second

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Throughput & Latency Curves:

Video Packets
­1
10 1
No SDMA        No SDMA       
3­channel SDMA 0.9 3­channel SDMA

0.8

Normalized Throughput
­2 0.7
10
0.6
PCF Latencies

0.5

0.4
­3
10
0.3

0.2
DCF:PCF = 1:1  DCF:PCF = 1:1 
0.1
Video Packets  Video Packets 
­4
10 0
0 100 200 300 400 500 0 100 200 300 400 500

Packets/Seconds Packets/Second

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Throughput & Latency Curves:

Video Packets
­1
10 1

No SDMA        0.9
3­channel SDMA
0.8

Normalized Throughput
­2
0.7
10
0.6
PCF Latencies

0.5

0.4
­3
10 0.3

0.2
DCF:PCF = 1:3  No SDMA       
DCF:PCF = 1:3  0.1 3­channel SDMA
Video Packets 
Video Packets 
­4 0
10 0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800
0 200 400 600 800

Packets/Seconds Packets/Second

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New Control Frame Subtypes for

Smart Antennas
• AP to STA
– A message requesting the STA to transmit a
preamble (null frame) for channel estimation
– Channel Id Request
• STA to AP
– A response to the above request
– Channel Id Response

Message Fields Frame

Duration RA TA FCS
Control

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Remove Polling Dependence

• The existing standards reads,
"During each CFP, the PC shall issue polls to a
subset of the STAs on the polling list in order by
ascending AID value".

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Conclusions
• Particularly in a large enterprise environment, smart
antennas can help boast capacity
– Wireless office replacement for "wired" Ethernet
– Public service networks such as airports
• Changes to the existing MAC are minor to enable
antenna technologies in IEEE802.11a networks
• SDMA is not for all WLANS
– Multiple antennas cost additional money for the
AP that may not be required in homes and small
businesses

Submissio Slide 18 Vinayak Nandikal

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