Channel partitioning forwireless local area networks

• US 20070060158A1
• Filed: 02/03/2006
• Published: 03/15/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 02/04/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Telcordia Technologies Incorporated (Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson), Toshiba Corporation
• Original Assignee: Telcordia Technologies Incorporated (Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson), Toshiba American Research, Inc. (Toshiba Corporation)
• Inventors: Matsuo, Ryoko, Famolari, David, Vakil, Faramak, Obayashi, Shuichi, Gopalakrishnan, Praveen, Kodama, Toshikazu, Medepalli, Kamesh
• Granted Patent: US 7,650,151 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/450
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/00 Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/542 using measured or perceived quality
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/12 WLAN [Wireless Local Area Networks]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/08 Access point devices

Abstract

The present application discloses, inter alia, a system for improving the aggregate throughput of a wireless local area network which includes: at least one access point that is equipped with at least one transceiver configured to simultaneously transmit and receive at multiple frequencies using multiple channels; and the access point being configured to acquire channel conditions of users and to pool sets of users on the channels based on the channel conditions.

Claims

1. A system for improving the aggregate throughput of a wireless local area network, comprising:

a) at least one access point that is equipped with at least one transceiver configured to simultaneously transmit and receive at multiple frequencies using multiple channels;

b) said access point being configured to acquire channel conditions of users and to pool sets of users on said channels based on said channel conditions.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein said at least one access point has a single radio that is configured to dynamically change the operating frequency.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein said access point is configured to assign users to channels based upon a heuristic algorithm.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein said access point is configured to assign users to channels based upon a PACK algorithm.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the system includes user terminals configured for at least two different networking specifications, and wherein users for a first of said networking specifications are placed on a first channel and users for a second of said networking specifications are placed on a second channel.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein said at least two networking specifications include IEEE 802.11g and IEEE 802.11b networking specifications.

7. A method for improving performance of a wireless local area network, comprising:

a) having an access point simultaneously transmit and receive communications on multiple channels; and

b) segregating users accessing said access point onto different ones of said channels based on differences in strengths of the users'"'"' channel conditions.

8. The method of claim 7, further including having said access point change the operating frequency in a dynamic manner using a single radio.

9. The method of claim 7, further including having said access point pool sets of users based on channel quality.

10. A system for improving performance in wireless communications to an IP network, comprising:

a) at least one access point that is equipped with at least one transceiver configured to simultaneously transmit and receive on multiple channels;

b) wherein said access point is configured to pool users onto said channels based channel conditions.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein said at least one access point is configured to respond to association requests from user stations configured to send or receive on only one of said channels at a given time, wherein said user stations are at differing locations and are capable of using different channel rates.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein said stations are in conversation with nodes in a wired network.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein said access point is configured to enable voice traffic.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein said access point is configured to enable packet data traffic.

15. The system of claim 10, wherein said access point is configured to assign users to channels based on a heuristic algorithm.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein:

a) the access point is configured to separate users into a number of classes of users having respective levels of throughput;

b) when the users can be admitted, the access point is configured to allocate said users to said channels as follows;

i) on each channel, the access point allocates as many users from a respective class as possible,

1) when the number of users in said respective class is less than the channel capacity for that class, there is no spill-over traffic of calls, and all said users in said respective class are allocated to that channel;

2) when the number of users in a class is more than the channel capacity for that class, there is spill-over traffic of calls, which calls are further assigned by the access point going through said classes in a step-wise manner starting at a higher throughput class so as to pair spill-over traffic having a higher throughput with that having a lower throughput.

17. The system of claim 15, wherein:

a) the access point is configured to separate users into a number of classes of users with different levels of throughput;

b) if the access point cannot accommodate all users, then the access point is configured to allocate users by going through user classes in a step-wise manner starting at a higher throughput first class, assigning as many of such users as possible, then moving onto a next class and then to subsequent classes.

18. The system of claim 10, wherein said access point is configured to handle asynchronous calls by admitting only users with similar channel conditions onto corresponding ones of said channels.

19. The system of claim 10, wherein in circumstances in which said access point receives external interference related to the presence of additional access points, said access point is configured to gauge the utilization of each of the channels and to establish a subset of said channels to be chosen.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein said access point is configured to maintain a moving window average of the channel load activity on each of the channels.

21. The system of claim 10, wherein said at least one access point includes an access point that has one transceiver that can simultaneously transmit and receive or two or more transceivers to enable simultaneous transmitting and receiving.