2008
GPRS
The mobile phone industry is changing in greater speed. Mobile phones are being introduced to the market on a regular basis. More and more technologies are released. We are currently at mobile technology’s 3rd generation or 3G telephony. New and advanced features such as web browsing are made available to the 3G mobile society.
The continuous development of 3G telephony still relies on the observations and studies conducted in 2G technologies. 2G and 3G technologies are popular and widely used. The GPRS or General Packet Radio Service lies in the middle of 2G and 3G.
GPRS consists of a series of functionalities that users of the Global System for Mobile Communications or GSM mobile phones benefit from. The focus remains on data streaming and transfer. Because it is more advanced than 2G, some refer to it as the 2.5G. GPRS improved transmission rates such that the standard speed of 9.6 per second reaches 11.5 kilobits per second.
Multiple users can use GPRS. Transmission channels can be shared by different users because these channels are only opened when a transfer is in place. Not all users have the constant need to transfer data. This makes the GPRS technology efficient for data transfers.
GPRS includes features such as instant messaging, internet browsing, and email reception. And because these activities require intermittent data transfers, they are the best functionalities that benefit from a shared bandwidth capability that is provided in the GPRS technology.
Shared transmission that is part of the GPRS functionality is referred to as the packet switching. Other functionalities include video sharing, multimedia messaging, and location based web services. However, these activities require streaming of larger data and may allow slower transfer speed.
GPRS is usually related to the EDGE technology. The main disparity is the quicker transmission rates in EDGE matched with low bandwidth prices.
GPRS bridges the 2G and 3G mobile technologies. With GPRS, it is possible to use laptop computers as GSM devices in the presence of satellite or Wi-Fi internet access.
