Cherry Mobile Ultra On The Go Review

The Cherry Mobile Ultra On The Go is one of the latest non-Android addition to the company’s growing portfolio. It’s a mobile hotspot (or pocket Wi-Fi, whichever you want to call it) that supports LTE connectivity which is priced at Php3,999.

Design and Construction

As with other LTE mobile hotspots out there, the Ultra On The Go is a small device that can easily fit inside your pocket which comes with all the bells and whistles that you typically expect from a device like this.

Nestled at the center of the device’s front panel is a 1-inch LCD screen which tells you pretty much everything you need to know about the status of the pocket Wi-Fi. On there you’ll find icons that corresponds to your network’s signal, battery status, and other network related stuff.

At the top you’ll find a pair of buttons for Power and WPS which is neighbored by two sockets that accepts after-market antenna/signal booster. Meanwhile, the Micro-USB and Reset hole are located at the bottom.

Accessing the battery and other internal components can be done by sliding the router’s removable back cover to the left. Once removed, you’ll have to take out the 2800mAh battery to access the SIM card and Micro-SD card slots.

Connectivity

As soon as we popped an LTE-provisioned SIM card inside the Ultra On The Go, it was able to pick up the 4G/LTE signal around our area (or at least that’s what the signal indicator tells us). We tested both Globe and Smart LTE SIM cards on the device and here are the results that we got:

Note: Results on the left were taken using a LTE SIM card. Meanwhile, the results on the right we’re taken with a 3G-only SIM.

As you can see, the results are a far cry from the advertised 42Mbps that our local telcos loves to say. Now, if you’re thinking that the device may be the bottleneck, we also tried testing the SIM cards on a different LTE mobile hotspot and the results were almost identical to the ones we have above.

Battery

To test its battery, we fully-charged the device and connected our work PC to CM’s Pocket Wi-Fi and let it sit there, disconnected from the wall outlet, while we were downloading files from the internet. From 100% state, it took 6 hours and 17 minutes before the Ultra On The Go’s 2800mAh battery got totally drained.

Conclusion

During our time with the Cherry Mobile Ultra On The Go, we’re happy to say that it performed as expected. It picked up 4G/LTE signal when it’s available and it has enough juice to last you a fair amount of time.

Lastly, it’s one thousand pesos cheaper than the LTE Pocket Wi-Fis that Globe and Smart is currently offering, and it’s open-line too so can use LTE-provisioned SIM cards from either of the two telcos mentioned above.

Cherry Mobile Ultra On The Go specs:
2G: GSM/GPRS/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 Mhz
3G: UMTS 850/2100 Mhz
4G: FDD-LTE B1/B3
1-inch LCD Screen
WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
1x Full-sized SIM card slot
1x MicroSD card slot, supports up to 32GB
2x Antenna ports
Removable 2800mAh

There’s still no word on when the CM Ultra On The Go will be available, but it will be sold for Php3,999 when it does.