The effect of Mobile IP handoffs on the performance of TCP

Mobile IP is a standard for handling routing for hosts that have moved from their home network. This paper studies the costs of the Mobile IP handoff that occurs when a mobile host moves between networks. Experiments were carried out with Mobile IP and TCP over varying network conditions to observe the effect of handoffs on the transmission. This paper shows that although Mobile IP may be appropriate for current applications, its long handoff periods make it unsuitable for the future.