Vertical Handover Decision Making in Heterogeneous Networks

Abstract

The future of wireless networks is expected to be a convergence of different wireless networks based on Radio Access Technology (RAT). The aim is to meet the performance demands of the new wireless world by providing seamless services to users any time and anywhere without compromising quality of service. The transition from one network to another which is known as inter network or vertical handover, needs a good decision making algorithm that decides the best network for a specific application needed by user. The handover or handoff process is one of a major importance process within any telecommunications network. Hence it is necessary to get a trustworthy performance based on QoS parameter. In other words unreliable service can result in a dropped calls and this is one of the key factors that can lead to customers’ dissatisfaction, which in turn may cause them to switch to other cellular network providers. This thesis aims to simulate the vertical handover decision making in heterogeneous wireless networks and evaluate the QoS for voice and data, using different basic bandwidth unit; this was done through a system-level MATLAB simulation. Different scenarios were considered. One of result the user moves away from the RAT, the RSS decreases then need handover to another network. also when providing a user with a high QoS, that is using a high value of bbu, for a single call, the number of channels available is less than when using a low value of bbu and providing the user with a low QoS for a single call