A Performance Evaluation Study of WiMAX Using Qualnet

IEEE802.16 is the standard defining the Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) for Metropolitan Area Network (MAN). WiMAX has recently being considered by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) as an attractive alternative to leasing lines from current ISPs or the deployment of new fiber networks. This is mainly the case since WiMAX is more flexible and much cheaper than other possible solutions. Our focus in this paper is on mobile WiMAX i.e. IEEE802.16e designed to provide broadband wireless access for mobile users. In this paper we have designed various scenarios using the Qualnet simulation package to evaluate the performance of WiMAX in delivering traffic under different operational conditions for a point to multi point configuration. The results showed how different factors such as load and mobility might affect the performance of WiMAX in a single cell environment. End to end delay, delay jitter and throughput were considered as the performance measures in this study.