[kiwijamo]

I've found LTE to be both faster and more reliable where I'm attached to a tower that provides LTE and UMTS in the same band (e.g. the 2degrees network in New Zealand uses the 900 MHz band for both UMTS and LTE at many of their sites). UMTS has remarkably poor peformance at the cell edge where it at best data connections can only deliver a few kilobits at random intervals whereas LTE provides a reliable and consistent data connection even if it is only 100kbps. I've seen LTE maintain a stable connection at signal levels where GSM would have long since dropped the connection and UMTS would struggle. Makes stuff like emails usable at the far edge of LTE coverage where it's impossible to achieve the same off the UMTS signal from the same tower in the same band. It's so good I hate it when my phone falls back to UMTS in places I know full well LTE service exists. Thankfully all three carries in my country are planning to switch off UMTS in the next two years which will greatly improve service.