The following depicts the architectural differences between GPRS and GSM:

☆ Mobile Station: New mobile station is needed for accessing GPRS services. They are backward compatible with GSM for voice calls

☆ Base Transceiver Station: Software upgrade is needed in the existing BTS

☆ Base Station Controller: Software upgrade and new hardware, Packet Control Unit are needed for GPRS.

☆ GPRS Support Nodes: Installation of new core network elements, known as serving GPRS support node, and gateway GPRS support node are needed to deploy GPRS

☆ Databases: Requires software upgrade to handle new models and functions to handle databases involved in the network