Wireless Mesh Access Technology

In all walks of life, the application of network technology is constantly maturing and diversified. In the face of different technologies, we will introduce you to the shortcomings of wireless Mesh access technology.

Wireless Mesh Access Technology

The physical characteristics of wireless communication determine that the shorter the communication distance, the higher the bandwidth, because with the increase of wireless transmission distance, various interference and other factors that lead to data loss will increase. Therefore, selecting to transmit data through multiple short hops is an effective way to obtain higher network bandwidth, which is the advantage of Mesh networks.

In a Mesh network, a node can not only send and receive information, but also act as a router to forward information to nearby nodes. As more nodes are connected to each other and the number of possible paths increases, the total bandwidth is also greatly increased. In addition, because the transmission distance of each short hop is short, the power required for data transmission is also small. Since multi-hop networks usually transmit data to neighboring nodes at a low power, the wireless signal interference between nodes is also small, and the channel quality and channel utilization efficiency of the network are greatly improved, therefore, higher network capacity can be achieved. For example, in a high-density urban network environment, Mesh networks can reduce mutual interference between adjacent users using wireless networks and greatly improve the efficiency of channel utilization.

Mesh Network limitations

Although wireless Mesh access technology has broad application prospects, there are also some problems that affect its extensive deployment.

(1) interoperability.

Currently, interoperability is an important obstacle affecting the rapid popularization of wireless Mesh access technologies. Wireless Mesh networks do not yet have a unified technical standard for access networks, currently, users can only use the wireless Mesh products of one vendor, or face the problem of interface with various types of Embedded wireless devices, this problem is currently the most important reason for the promotion and use of wireless Mesh access technology. To completely solve the interoperability problem, the industry also needs to develop unified wireless Mesh access technical standards.

(2) Communication delay.

Since the data in the Mesh network is sent through multiple jumps through the intermediate node, each hop will at least cause some latency. As the scale of the wireless Mesh network expands, the more hops, the total accumulated latency increases. Applications with high requirements on communication latency, such as voice or streaming media applications, may face unacceptable delays that are too long. Currently, this problem is solved by adding Mesh nodes and appropriate network protocols.

(3) Security

Compared with the single hop mechanism of WLAN, the multi-hop mechanism of wireless Mesh access technology determines that user communication goes through more nodes. The more nodes that data communication passes, the more security issues that cannot be ignored. The Internet itself is a typical example of Mesh-based communication, and its security risks are well known. Although various end-to-end security technologies used in wired networks, such as virtual private network (VPN), can also be used to solve the security problem of wireless Mesh. However, like the Internet, the security of wireless Mesh networks cannot be ignored.

Mesh network applications

Essentially, a Mesh network is similar to a point-to-point wireless network architecture, which can greatly reduce the network infrastructure costs (such as the number of AP and wireless routers ), it can also reduce the number of wireless network service providers by 70% ~ 75% of operating and installation costs.

Based on the advantages of Mesh networks, it can also provide a variety of services in different heterogeneous environments. When users are moving at high speed, alternatively, you can transmit voice and data through 3G or 2G in a large range of regions. You can also use WLAN to provide broadband network services, such as on-demand videos. With the further development of the Mesh network, it can eventually integrate office phones or mobile phones in the enterprise's office environment. Mesh networks have broad application prospects in many fields such as home, enterprise, and public places.