Objective

Compare the total achievable WLAN throughputs measured in a mixed 11b/11g WLAN and in an all-11g WLAN to study the performance degradation in 11g WLANs that support legacy nodes.

Methodology

• Create a wireless LAN where all the stations and access point are operating at the 11g data rate of 54 Mbps.

• Make the stations generate traffic that is heavy enough to saturate the network to measure the highest aggregate throughput achieved in that 11g wireless LAN.

• Make all this traffic to flow in the uplink direction (i.e., to a destination that is outside of the wireless LAN) to prevent the access point being a bottleneck, and therefore, reducing the total throughput significantly.

• Configure a legacy station using 11b PHY while not generating any traffic that will roam and associate with the above described 11g WLAN for a certain period of the simulation.

• Compare the total achieved throughput in the 11g WLAN when the legacy node is associated and not associated with the WLAN's access point.