SMART LTE: My Smart Evolution Experience

I gave you a preview before of what Smart LTE  or Smart Evolution is all about. I also shared with you how happy I am that SMART has asked me to be one of the first to use its prototype LTE USB dongle from HUAWEI. They are pre-launching this 4G technology in Boracay where I am currently doing my soul searching. Since I am mostly online during my regular waking hours, plus I’ve been a loyal customer of Smart since 1999 I figured, it would really be a great honor to be the first of its users.

A little background info here:

4G is an advertising/marketing term used by companies who promote services using technologies better than 3G. See Wikipedia for more technical info.

Right now,  SMART  3G towers are easily upgraded to accommodate LTE (long term evolution) bringing 50Mbps of internet speed, and soon, LTE Advanced to bring 100Mbps  of internet speed. 4G enabled phones will be released to access this kind of super data network. But for now, I have the dongle (which also runs on Snow Leopard) to enjoy and make the most out of. 

Before I go any further telling you about how I find the long term evolution or SMART Evolution service, let me just make it clear that I am no techie. In fact, it was only yesterday that I learned from Jayvee the difference between MEGABYTES and MEGABITS. Honestly, I don’t care about the numbers. What I care about more is if the service itself will give me a fast, reliable, efficient and productive online experience.
 
Here in Boracay, I brought my two old laptops with me. I rarely use the bigger one (ACER) since it’s bulky and it couldn’t connect to the wifi service in my room for some reason. So I ended up using the small one, an ASUS eepc.

Whenever I do my tasks online, I’d log in 8-12 hours of work every single night managing social networks, surfing sites, emailing, blogging, uploading photos and videos, and watching youtube. I have long ago given up on torrenting movies and songs since it further slows down my pc, therefore making me less productive at work. This is primarily the reason why I said yes to SMART when they asked me to try their LTE service. I wanted to see if I can do all these things (and more) at much faster speeds  without hindering me from being productive on my other more important online tasks.

Day 1, Wednesday, April 20

At 8 am, I met up with SMART LTE’s network engineers. They configured my ASUS eepc and I got this speed: http://www.speedtest.net/result/1260220470.png

I know… I know. I’m sure most of you probably has more high tech PCs and are disappointed with this result. But hey, for me, this was already heaven! Normally, with just the regular wifi in my room, this is the speed I’m getting: http://www.speedtest.net/result/1260698924.png

And according to Uniblue speedupmypc, I have 1,477 issues affecting the speed of my Asus eepc. But with Smart LTE, I was ale to download a Katy Perry song in seconds and I was able to upload on youtube a video I took of the configuration  process  in just 11 minutes. When I was watching Youtube videos, there was no buffering at all! I have NEVER experienced these kinds of speeds EVER before! This happened by the beach, just across Starbucks, somewhere in Station 2, which is included in the hot zone of  SMART LTE network service.

That same night, when I went back to my room almost near Angol beach and way beyond the coverage of the LTE network service, I just plugged the dongle once again just to see if it’s true. As it turned out, the dongle was still able to get 35% signal strength.

As low as that seems, I was able to do 12 hours of work at half the time. How much more if I was within the hot zone? This got me more excited! This means with SMART LTE, I can accept more work and do them all in less amount of time. Woohoo!

Day 2, Thursday, April 21

I was advised that if I use a regular-sized laptop, the internet speed I’d get would increase considerably. So for the first time in three weeks, I opened my ACER laptop. While the network engineers of Smart LTE were troubleshooting the systems, and while the rest of SMART people were busy setting up their booths and concert ground, I had my old ACER configured.

Then we did a speedtest. This was the result: http://www.speedtest.net/result/1261800074.png

Indeed, the difference in internet speed between my ASUS eepc and ACER laptop was huge!

In the afternoon, I heard that some people were getting speeds as high as 62Mbps. I thought I should do a speed test again when I visit their booth the next day!

Day 3, Friday, April 22

I was up all night doing stuff online using the 35% signal strength of SMART LTE I was getting in my room despite its great distance from Station 2. As soon as the sun rose the next morning, I got my ACER ready and went all the way to Bombom Bar to check the speed of my PC and download some movies and songs. I got this result: http://www.speedtest.net/result/1263310755.png

When the dongle I was using was plugged to an HP PC, it got the 44.45mbps download speed. I wondered why…

So we compared specs of our pc. My old ACER has an Intel Pentium processor.

The other HP PC has  Intel Core Duo processor.

This means, the higher specs your PC has, the higher speeds you can experience with SMART LTE! Maybe I should buy a new PC. It’s also right about time since my old Acer is already5 years old. ^_^
 
All in all, my experience with SMART LTE / Smart Evolution has been nothing but amazing! Despite the fact that I used my two super old, low spec PCs, I was able to experience internet speeds which according to speedtest.net, are higher than 99% of the Philippines!
 
I reckon that this will be a great investment to companies, businesses,  families and even individuals who are heavy users of the internet. It’s like having your own private internet highway. Whether you’re driving a Ferrari (high tech PCs like Mac) or a Toyota (low tech PCs like mine), you will still experience a smooth-sailing, no traffic ride.
 
I can’t wait to know how much the selling price will be! It’s going to be commercially launched within this year. Til then, folks!