Performance analysis of an integrated voice/data mobile radio system

The author analyzes the performance of a mobile radio system which dynamically integrates voice and data onto common radio channels. The key to the integrated voice/data system is a novel network switching technique, packetized data voice dedicated burst switching, which transmits the voice traffic in talkspurt-sized bursts and transmits data between the talkspurts in small, fixed-size packets. System performance is analyzed via computer simulations, which show that a voice-only mobile radio system can be upgraded to an integrated voice/data system without adding additional radio channels and without compromising voice performance. The entire data load of the system can be transmitted within the silence gaps of the speech without affecting voice traffic. The data traffic is only minimally delayed (46.2 ms mean delay for a system fully loaded with voice; shorter mean delay for lighter voice loading). Simulation results also show that the integrated voice/data system can accommodate significant growth in data traffic and still perform with very acceptable data delays