WP7.1. System Performance Evaluation

The first task of this WP is the system level performance evaluation of the generalised air interface according to the architecture proposed in WP6. The objective of this task is to evaluate the performance of the proposed architectures and algorithms when integrated into the whole network. Based on the algorithms and channel models from WP6, a detailed evaluation will be given by means of link and system level simulations. Appropriate interfaces between both simulators will also be defined in this task. In general, the link-level simulator generates look-up tables that relate the Packet Error Rate to the channel metric (usually stated in terms of Eb/No or SNR) for different channel conditions, multiplexing and interference scenarios.

The system level simulator will be used for evaluation of system performance metrics like capacity and throughput, signalling overhead, energy consumption, coverage, reconfiguration time, etc. The evaluations will be performed with various mobility scenarios or models, environments (rural, city, etc.), network configurations (pure SURFACE, SURFACE+UMTS, etc). Since the SURFACE concept is not a pure cellular technology, but is also envisioned for FWA and WLAN, mobility models, environments, and network configurations reflecting these systems must be included to obtain a valuable evaluation. Sensitivity of different protocol parameter settings and restrictions (e.g. available frequency bands) on the system performance are also important aspects to take into consideration.