Theoretical Description and Performance Analysis of Various IEEE 802.11 Standards

With the increasing requirements of fast intranet, fast connection, fast uploading and downloading speed, IEEE established the 802.11 group. IEEE 802.11, Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) is a wireless broadband technology. The products based on 802.11 provide reduced data rates in order to maintain the connectivity at far distant from the access point. Hence, its popularity comes from its simplicity, high data rate, ease installation, low cost, high range and consolidated handoff. To follow the trend, this paper presents the basic introduction of IEEE 802.11 standard and its family. As the data rate supports by the original IEEE 802.11 is too low, the IEEE ratified it and form other (IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n/ac) standards. This paper also provides a huge description of various standards of IEEE 802.11 and major differences between them. The operation modes and the protocol architecture of IEEE 802.11 standard are also introduced in this article. In this paper, the IEEE 802.11n channel models and the BER performance of IEEE 802.11 are also simulated using the MATLAB.