2010 International Conference on Intelligent Network and Computing (ICINC 2010)

Performance Analysis of DSR and AODV Routing Protocols

Shakeel Ahmed A K Ramani

Abstract—An Ad-hoc network consists of wireless nodes This reactive nature of these protocols is a significant
dynamically forming a temporary network without the use of departure from more traditional proactive protocols. The
any existing network infrastructure or centralized key motivation behind the design of on-demand protocols is
administration. An Ad-hoc network needs to have routing the reduction of the routing load. High routing load usually
protocols which can adopt dynamically changing topology. To has a significant performance impact in low bandwidth
accomplish this, a number of Ad hoc routing protocols have wireless links. While DSR and AODV share the on-demand
been proposed and implemented, which include Destination- behavior in that they initiate routing activities only in the
Sequenced Distance-Vector (DSDV), Ad-hoc On-Demand presence of data packets in need of a route, many of their
Distance Vector Routing (AODV), Dynamic Source Routing
routing mechanics are very different. In particular, DSR uses
(DSR) and Temporally Ordered Routing Algorithm (TORA).
In this paper, we examine two on demand routing protocols
source routing, but AODV uses a table-driven routing
DSR and AODV to analyze the performance differentials by framework and destination sequence numbers. DSR does not
varying network load, mobility and network size with the help rely on any timer-based activities, but AODV does to a
of ns-2 simulator. Simulation results shows that the DSR certain extent. One of our goals in this study is to extract the
perfectly behaves with smaller networks with lower speed of relative merits of these mechanisms. The motivation is that a
nodes and AODV reveals more efficient use of bandwidth. The better understanding of the relative merits will serve as a
focus of our paper is on those approaches that are relevant to cornerstone for development of more effective routing
our work. protocols for mobile Ad hoc networks.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. In section 2
Keywords-AODV, DSR, MANET, NS-2 we briefly review the DSR and AODV protocols. In Section
3, we present a detailed critique of the two protocols,
I. INTRODUCTION focusing on the differences on their dynamic behaviors that
Advances in wireless technology and greater user can lead to performance differences. In section 4 we
mobility have provided a major impetus toward development described the simulation environment, Section 5
of an emerging class of self-organizing, rapidly deployable performance comparison of the protocols. We draw our
network architectures referred to as Ad-hoc networks. An conclusions in Section 6.
Ad-hoc network is a collection of wireless mobile nodes
dynamically forming a temporary network without relying II. DESCRIPTION OF DSR/AODV AND RELATED WORK
on extraneous hardware. These networks are built, operated, A. DSR(Dynamic Source Routing)
and maintained by their constituent wireless nodes. These
nodes generally have a limited transmission range and, so, DSR (Dynamic Source Routing) [1] is a reactive on-
each node seeks the assistance of its neighboring nodes in demand routing protocol for multi-hop wireless Ad hoc
forwarding packets where mobile access to a wired network networks of mobile nodes. DSR uses source routing and
is either ineffective or impossible. Potential applications for protocol composed of two main mechanisms-‘Route
this class of network include instant network infrastructure Discovery’ and ‘Route Maintenance’, which works together
to support collaborative computing in temporary or mobile entirely, on-demand. It works only when two nodes want to
environments, emergency rescue networks for disaster communicate with each other. Route Discovery and Route
management, remote control of electrical appliance, Maintenance are built to behave according to changes in the
communication systems such as IVC (Inter-Vehicle routes in use, adjusting them-selves when needed.
Communications). The nodes in an Ad hoc network The protocol allows routing of packets to be loop free and
generally have limited battery power and, so, reactive also allows caching of routes in nodes for future use. DSR
routing protocols endeavor to save power by discovering allows multiple routes to any destination, thus can lead
routes only when they are essentially. easily to load balancing or increase robustness. In the source
Our intention is to study the performance of two dynamic routing technique, a sender determines the exact sequence
routing protocols for Ad hoc networks — Dynamic Source of nodes through which to propagate a packet. The list of
Routing protocol (DSR) [1], and Ad Hoc On-Demand intermediate nodes for routing is explicitly contained in the
Distance Vector protocol (AODV) [2]. Both DSR and packet’s header. In DSR, every mobile node in the network
AODV share an interesting common characteristic — they needs to maintain a route cache where it caches source
both initiate routing activities on an “on demand” basis.

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routes that it has learned. When a host wants to send a According to the specification of AODV it includes an
packet to some other host, it first checks its route cache for optimization technique to control the RREQ flood in the
a source route to the destination. In the case a route is found, route discovery process. It uses an expanding ring search
the sender uses this route to propagate the packet. Otherwise initially to discover routes to an unknown destination. In the
the source node initiates the route discovery process. expanding ring search, increasingly larger neighborhoods are
Route discovery works by flooding the network with searched to find the destination. The search is controlled by
route request (RREQ) packets. Each node receiving a RREQ, the TTL field in the IP header of the RREQ packets. If the
rebroadcasts it, unless it is the destination or it has a route to route to a previously known destination is needed, the prior
the destination in its route cache. Such a node replies to the hop-wise distance is used to optimize the search.
RREQ with a route reply (RREP) packet that is routed back
IV. SIMULATION RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
to the original source. RREQ and RREP packets are also
source routed. The RREQ builds up the path traversed so far. The performance of the protocols depends on various
The RREP routes itself back to the source by traversing this interrelating adhered metrics. The most important parameters
path backwards. The route carried back by the RREP packet are Packet delivery rate, Mobility, Packet dropped and
is cached at the source for future use. If any link on a source average end-to-end delay of data packets have been
route is broken, the source node is notified using a route considered herein to draw an analytical observation using ns-
error (RERR) packet. The source removes any route using 2 simulator[4].
this link from its cache. A new route discovery process must In this paper we use traffic and mobility model based on
be initiated by the source, if this route is still needed. Continuous bit rate (CBR) traffic sources. Only 512-byte
data packets are used. To change the offered load in the
network the number of source-destination pairs and the
packet sending rate in each pair is varied The mobility model
uses the random waypoint model in a rectangular field. The
field configurations used is: 500 m x 500 m field with 10, 20
50 and 100 nodes. Here, each packet starts its journey from a
random location to a random destination with a randomly
chosen speed (uniformly distributed between 0-20 m/s).
Simulations are run for 100 simulated seconds. Identical
mobility and traffic scenarios are used across. The
Figure 1. Node P is the initiator and Node T is the target simulation parameters which have been considered for
analyzing the performance comparison of two on-demand
III. AODV (AD HOC ON-DEMAND DISTANCE VECTOR) routing protocols is given below in Table 1.
AODV (Ad hoc on-demand distance vector) [2], is a TABLEI. PARAMETERS USED IN EXPERIMENT SCENARIO
purely reactive routing protocol; it offers low network
utilization and uses destination sequence number to ensure Simulation Parameters
loop freedom. In which each terminal does not need to keep Protocols AODV, DSR
a view of the whole network or a route to every other Number of Mobile 10,20,50,100
terminal. Nor does it need to periodically exchange route Nodes
information with the neighbor terminals. When a mobile Simulation Area 500 m x 500 m
terminal has packets to send to a destination it need to Simulation duration 100 seconds
discover and maintain a route to that destination terminal. In
Mobility Model Random waypoint
AODV, each terminal contains a route table for a destination
and one entry per destination. A route table stores the Traffic Type Constant bit rate(CBR)
following information: destination address and its sequence Packet Size 512 bytes
number, active neighbors for the route, hop count to the Max Speed 20m/s
destination, and expiration time for the table. An important
feature of AODV is that it uses a destination sequence Packet delivery rate: Packet delivery rate is the rate at
number, which corresponds to a destination node that was which the data packets generated by the CBR sources and
requested by a routing sender node. The destination itself delivered to the destinations. The results shows that the rate
provides the number along with the route it has to take to of packet loss for each of the protocols AODV and DSR,
reach from the request sender node up to the destination. If simulated under the same conditions with 10 sources and at
there are multiple routes from a request sender to a the same time comparing their rates of control packets used
destination, the sender takes the route with a higher sequence for the routing function.
number. The expiration time is updated each time the route Mobility: One of the major parameter of an Ad hoc
is used. If this route has not been used for a specified period network is Mobility. Since an Ad-hoc network is primarily
of time, it is discarded. characterized by its ever-changing topology, so mobility of
This ensures that the Ad hoc network protocol remains nodes is an important consideration. Mobility of a node is a
loop-free. function of both speed and movement patterns. This

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 2010 International Conference on Intelligent Network and Computing (ICINC 2010)

simulation analysis is made from the Fig. 1 for 10 sources. that byte overhead in each packet can affect the total byte
First we analyze the first parameter Packet delivery ratio overhead when the load offered and size of the network
with respect varied Maximum speed of nodes. Figure 2 increases. One advantage with source routing is that during
shows the relative performance test result of the AODV and route discovery operation it learns more routes. A
DSR routing protocols. All of the protocols deliver a greater combination of the protocols can be used for good result.
percentage of the originated data packets when there is little
node mobility, converging to 90% delivery ratio when there REFERENCES
is no node motion. The On-demand protocol AODV [1] David B. Johnson, David A. Maltz, Yih-Chun Hu. The Dynamic
performed particularly well, while DSR could not achieve Source Routing Protocol for Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (DSR).
good packet delivery ratio when moving more frequently. Internet Draft,draft-ietf-manet-dsr- [Link], 15 April 2003.
[2] C. Perkins, E. Belding-Royer and S. Daas. RFC 3561: Ad hoc On-
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[6] Broch .J, Maltz .D, Johnson. D,Hu. Y, Jetsceva J A Performance
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Figure 2. Packet Delivery Ratio as function of Maximum Speed Mobility AODV/DSR On-Demand Routing Protocols for Ad Hoc Networks in
Constrained Situation", IEEE ICPWC 2005.
End-To-End Delay : Fig. 2 shows the delay comparison
of the two protocols. For on-demand-driven protocols, it is
hard to say their performance relationship between the pause
times. The curve jumped a lot with the pause time change.
The second parameter Normalized End-To-End delay with
varied pause times is analyzed and it is found that for DSR it
is less when compared to AODV and we see that it is fairly
stable even with increase number of sources. Further
experiments should be done in order to make definitely
conclusion.

Figure 3. End-To-End Delay (sec)

V. CONCLUSION :
In this paper the basic actions related to the two routing
protocols namely AODV and DSR were studied in detail. On
demand driven protocols, as AODV, DSR, performed very
well for packet delivery with fast movement and mobility
rate. AODV seems to perform better than DSR on some
situations. However, when mobility increases AODV has
generally better performance. The On-demand protocol
AODV performed particularly well, while DSR could not
achieve good packet delivery ratio when moving more
frequently. DSR is source routing protocol, which means

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