EFFECT OF MOBILE TERMINAL HETEROGENEITY ON CONNECTION-LEVEL QOS IN NEXT GENERATION WIRELESS NETWORKS

This paper investigate the effect of using heterogeneous mobile terminals (e.g. single-mode, dual-mode, triple-mode, etc.) on call blocking and call dropping probabilities in next generation wireless networks (NGWN). We develop an analytical model for heterogeneous mobile terminals in NGWN. Using a two-class three-RAT heterogeneous wireless network as an example, the effect of using heterogeneous terminals in the network is evaluated. Results show the overall call blocking/ dropping probability experienced by subscribers in heterogeneous wireless networks depends on the capabilities of mobile terminals used by the subscribers. In the worst case scenario, when all subscribers use single-mode mobile terminals, each subscriber is confined to a single RAT and consequently, joint radio resource management in the heterogeneous network has no improvement on new call blocking and handoff call dropping probabilities. However, in the best case scenario, when all subscribers use three-mode terminals, new class-1 call blocking probability decreases from 0.37 (for 100% single-mode terminals) to 0.05, at the arrival rate of 6 calls per minute. New class-2 call blocking probability also decreases from 0.8 to 0.52. Similarly, handoff class-1 call dropping probability decreases from 0.14 to 0.003, and handoff class-2 call dropping probability decreases from 0.44 to 0.09.