Multiple input multiple output (MIMO) is one of the key technology to accomplish the goal of the future wireless broadband communication.This paper deals with the bit error rate (BER) and capacity performance of the Vertical Bell laboratories layered space-time (VBALST) MIMO systems with a linear receiver such as minimum mean-square error (MMSE) and zero forcing (ZF) over Nakagami-m channel. Both the BER and the capacity of MIMO systems have been analyzed for different modulation techniques and also with various configurations of MIMO systems. We have also analyzed the VBLAST MIMO system performance in a higher SNR region.