On the traffic disruption time and packet lost rate during the handover mechanisms in wireless networks

Personal communication systems (PCS) aim to provide ubiquitous service to its subscribers. In order to fulfil the ubiquity requirement for service, PCS rely on two main features: use of wireless communications technology and mobility management. The former sets the basis to untie subscribers from a wire allowing them to freely move around. The latter allows subscribers to gain access to the network services at all times regardless of their location. A handover is the process used to allow a call in progress to continue as the associated subscriber moves around. A large number of handover mechanisms have been reported in the literature. In this article, we carry out a comprehensive performance study of the handover mechanisms as proposed in the literature. A detailed simulation model has been developed allowing us to set up parameters such as the speed and motion path of the mobile terminal. The performance metrics of interest are: the length of the disruption time caused by the handover mechanism and the number of lost packets caused by the handover mechanism. Under the scenario under consideration, the handovers using multicasting mechanism and full reestablishment mechanism exhibit the best results.