On the Effectiveness of High-Speed WLAN Standards for Long Distance Communication

Long-distance WiFi networks are a cost-effective means for providing Internet connectivity in developing regions. In these regions, providing support for real-time applications is considered an important requirement. Unlike prior works, this paper studies the effectiveness of features (e. g., frame aggregation and channel bonding) of 802.11n/ac in improving the performance of long-distance WiFi links as well as their ability to support real-time applications. Towards this end, we established a 7.1 km link using commodity 802.11n equipment. Our results yielded a throughput of up to 36 Mbps by only changing 802.11 parameter values. In addition, we show that our setup also meets the delay and jitter requirements of real-time applications.