Performance evaluation of six mesh router replacement methods for wireless mesh networks: A comparison study for small and middle scale networks considering two islands distribution of mesh clients

In this paper, we present a hybrid intelligent simulation system for optimization of mesh routers in Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs) called WMN-PSOHCDGA. We implemented six mesh router replacement methods: CM, RIWM, LDIWM, LDVM, RDVM and FC-RDVM and consider Two Islands distribution of mesh clients. We carry out a comparison study of these router replacement methods for small and middle scale WMNs. We assessed the performance by computer simulations. The simulation results show that six methods have a good performance for connectivity and coverage metrics, for both small and middle scale WMNs. However, they have different behavior for load balancing. For small scale WMNs, the load balancing of LDIWM, RIWM and FC-RDVM is better than CM, LDVM and RDVM. While, comparing LDIWM, RIWM and FC-RDVM, the LDIWM has better load balancing. We found that the load balancing for small scale WMNs is not good, because there is a concentration of mesh routers in some areas. For middle scale WMNs, the CM, LDIWM, LDVM and RDVM have not a good load balancing. While, the RIWM and FC-RDVM have better performance. Comparing RIWM and FC-RDVM, we found that the load balancing of FC-RDVM is better than RIWM.