First Day of Airtel 4G

Most of you do know about #Airtel4G. Well, I have seen a lot of my friends talk about it on Facebook, Twitter and the blogs. Airtel has launched its 4G services at Cochin on August 25th and at Calicut on August 26th. Airtel has chosen Onam as the right moment here, and I couldn’t agree more about this choice. It is also available at the same price as 3G, and home delivery of SIMs is also known to be there. Airtel leads the way here, and being the first one here, holds the advantage. I was given a chance to preview #Airtel4G and I am going to give an account of what happened after that.

The sample 4G enabled phone – a Samsung Galaxy A5 [16GB]

Even though it was made perfectly clear that this was for the city of Cochin only, I took my chances and tried this at Perumbavoor, and I am sure that the situation is the same at the other towns which are around the place – Kothamangalam, Muvattupuzha and Angamaly. At these towns the 4G device as well as the 4G mobile works only on 2G. There will be no shifting to 3G here as the switching is done directly to 2G. The Airtel 4G Mobile Wi-Fi device had some difficulties with my laptop, but worked perfectly with my mobile without 4G – on my Asus Zenfone 5.

So, I decided to return to the city on the first day and make sure that this 2G became 4G again. I made the decision to travel on the same route which I took on the day on which I attended the preview at Kaloor – the speed test had been a dream success at that time. Kaloor did seem to the place where the 4G was stronger than ever – it was so quick. But on this day, I decided to choose Thrikkakkara instead. It used to be one of my most visited places during the time I spent at Bharata Matha College. So, I thought that I would start the 4G adventure from the home of one my friends there.

Vampire Owl: So, what is the plan, soldier?

Vampire Bat: We attack the City of Cochin for #Airtel4G from all flanks. We desire and deserve high speed internet. See the map below for further information.

A simplified map of the very complicated attack plan to get the high speed internet 😛

The place was aroung Vazhakkala at Thrikkakkara, just about two or three minutes walk from the main road near Biriyani Hut. The 4G was not easy to find inside home, even though it was available outside home; and so we decided to go to the terrace to see if it could do more. The scene was a lot better there on the top, and the 4G was strong there. I had problems in connecting my laptop to the device there too (even though I realized later that I could do it with the USB cable when the Wi-Fi failed me). I apologize for my lack of knowledge related to technology – I am just not into it much.

I checked the speed on the mobile with the 4G SIM and also on my 3G phone connecting it to the 4G Wi-Fi device. It was excellent – I am not a person who has had a great experience with speed throughout my life, and I have tolerated the lower speeds with great patience – the only change to that was when I was in the UK (I don’t remember much from then though). Here with the Airtel 4G, I got 40-50 MB Android apps downloaded in around 30 seconds. Well, I am not used to such speed; never with any of the internet connections which I have used. This is surely my fastest internet experience so far, and the rest of my life has just got slower.

The Airtel 4G Mobile Wi-Fi device, or “the Mi-Fi”

I connected my laptop to the Wi-Fi hotspot on the mobile with 4G SIM. My Windows 10 download just began again from where it had stopped at ten percent. I decided to wait for it to complete and the download took about fourty five minutes to finish the rest of the ninety percent of a total 2.7 GB as it was shown on the window. If I was to sit at home and use my usual broadband connection, it was to take a lot more time, and for the 2.5 GB, it would take me around eighteen to twenty hours – I might need to keep the laptop switched on for the whole night to make sure that things go smoothly for me during the day.

We actually stopped on the Seaport-Airport road on our way back, close to Bharata Mata College, and the speed test made it to the highest I had got. Well, I am not sure how that works, but returning home and checking the internet speed of my broadband made me feel that a return to the Stone Age was happening and I needed to resist the same. But unfortunately, 4G is not available at my town yet. I have to wait for it, and until now, I hope to use 4G during my regular visit to the theatres at Cochin – as long as there are multiplexes and movies, I can use this to my advantage.

Soon to follow with Day 2 of #Airtel4G: Hopefully with Aluva-Kalamassery-Kakkanad-Thrippunithura! 🙂 Lets also talk about the devices and how they have been/will be further helpful for me on the next few days.

TeNy

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