Pakistan Telecommunication Corporation Limited (PTCL) has brought the name of Pakistan among few countries in the world which are offering ultra high speed internet services. PTCL has recently introduced a 4G fixed-wireless based internet service named “EVO CharJi” based upon its evolution data optimized (EVDO) based network. It has been described as a long term evolution in high speed internet services in Pakistan since nearly all of the mobile phone operators are still developing the infrastructure in various areas of major cities of the country. Initially this service is going to be offered in 4 cities namely Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi and Islamabad with the highest downlink speed of 36Mbps. The slogan of the service “No wait, No buffer time, No lag — Charji gets you connected to your online world in seconds” reflects the current best standards in the world for internet connections of seamless streaming, cloud computing and video conferencing.
According to the company, peak service data rate of up to 18-36Mbps Download & 7-14Mbps on uploads, while an average speeds of 5-15 Mbps on downlink & 2-5 Mbps on uplink can be experienced in normal circumstances of load sharing. There are 3 devices being offered with different specificity and fall-back capabilities in areas of no or limited 4G connectivity.
Following are the device prices as per the announcement,
- Charji EVO Dongle (Rev.A Fallback) 3,000 Nil (free air time)
- Charji EVO Cloud (Rev.A Fallback) 13,550 3 Months (free air time)
- Charji EVO Cloud (Rev.B Fallback) 15,000 4 Months (free air time)
Currently two packages are being offered with a limited promotional offer valid on purchases in the month of December 2014 of double volume each month for one year on all post and prepay connections.
- CharJi Chrome — Line rent 2,000/month reg. volume 25 GB promo volume 50GB
- CharJi Gold –Line rent 3,500/month reg. volume 50 GB promo volume 100 GB
Additional 10 GB bucket can be purchased for rupees 500 only twice for post pay and unlimited for prepaid connections. The fallback connection to EVDO Rev A gives speeds of up to 3.1 Mbps with EVO Rev A network in 250+ cities and EVDO Rev B with speeds up to 9.3 Mbps in 200+ cities where PTCL has respective compatible infrastructure. Moreover the 4G devices have the WiFi functionality allowing up to 10 simultaneous WiFi connections at a time.
It has been considered that the fair usage policy and restriction on volume usage are anti piracy measures which are placed in order to keep the pirates away from such device especially considering the blinking speed of the internet being offered.
This latest offering by PTCL enables the company to remain the leader in Wi-Fi connectivity in the country which introduced the 3G EVO wireless connections in 2008. Since then PTCl has travelled a long distance by offering 3G EVO hotspot enabled devices and 3G EVO nitro devices in collaboration with Chinese giant electronic company, Huawei, which manufactures the PTCL EVO devices. The EVO devices have enjoyed great success in the country as many customer oriented packages have been offered previously to attract the consumers of nearly all sorts. EVO CharJi is also expected to have packages announced in coming times next year.
The devices can be obtained through various options including visiting the one stop shop at all PTCL stations, authorized retail and TCS outlets and TCS home delivery order through TCSconnect.com.