Impact of wireless propagation channel parameters on IEEE 802.11n performances

Using techniques such as spatial division multiplexing (SDM), transmit beamforming, and space-time block coding (STBC), MIMO systems like IEEE 802.11n are conceived to increase dramatically throughput or to improve the reception range. Nevertheless, MIMO equipment in an indoor environment shows that the power level received in non-noisy conditions is not sufficient to explain the throughput variations. Therefore, in this paper, parameters, other than the received power, related to the radio transmission channel are identified in order to explain the performance of MIMO systems by the mean of simulation. The impact of these studied parameters i.e. the angular spread, the angles of departure and arrival (AOD & AOA), the antenna spacing, and the MIMO channel correlation coefficient on the Packet Error Rate (PER) is highlighted.