TCP Performance over Mobile Networks in High-Speed Mobility Scenarios

Abstract

Recently, the performance of mobile data networks has been evaluated from many aspects, e.g., TCP/IP protocols, comparison with WiFi or even satellite communication, under different movements within a metropolis area. Nevertheless, the result is still unknown in high-speed mobility scenarios and in a scale that crosses different metropolis and geographic areas. To fill in this blank, we carry out a comprehensive measurement study on the performance of mobile data networks under high-speed mobility, i.e., 300 km/h or above. Such speed is the current de facto standard of the China Railway High speed (CRH) network, the largest commercial high-speed railway network in the world so far. We first present an overview on the TCP performance over LTE networks. We observe that decent throughput may exist under high-speed mobility. However, comparing to the stationary and driving (100 km/h) scenarios, the throughput and RTT not only are worse, but also have a large variance. We then take an in-depth investigation into two key factors affecting the performance, i.e., The wireless channel and handoff. We believe our study on these factors is useful not only for TCP, but also for other upper-layer protocols.