Performance Analysis of Workload Effects over Motorway Wireless Ad Hoc Camera Networks

Packet size and packet rate are two important parameters that need to be considered when using wireless networks in any application. Different values of these parameters provide different network performance. Sending large packets over wireless networks leads to reduce packet header overhead, but may have adverse impact on the number of lost packets due to collisions or corruptions in a wireless channel which leads to degrade in network performance. Therefore the values of these parameters must be chosen carefully. This paper presents an investigation and analysis of using different packet sizes and different packet rates on the performance of a motorway surveillance system comprised of wireless cameras placed along a roadway. The investigation and analysis were performed under varying network environments and for several different evaluation metrics. It is a conclusion of this study that the small packet size results in better network performance as compared to the larger packet size. Moreover, the slow packet rate can provide better network performance than using faster packet rate in motorway surveillance system camera networks.