Homegrown phone maker Micromax has a problem. For the last few weeks, buyers have been complaining that they just can’t get enough of its new phone- the Canvas 2 A110. Apparently, the 5 inch Android phone is selling really fast and Micromax is having trouble keeping up with the demand. Its a good problem to have though.
After a week long wait, we got our hands on one of these phones. The local retailer who sold it to us, had sent his man all the way to the headquarters where he haggled for the piece. What makes it so special?
The Micromax A110, being sold as the “phone that can” is an amazing phone. Wait. Tablet. No. Phablet. Its is a combination of amazing specs, good looks and clever pricing. Do we hear a fanboy talking? Not yet. But we’ve had it for about a couple of weeks and it’s been a great experience so far.
The given
The phone has wi-fi, 3G and most of the latest features. The processor is a 1 GHz Dual Core Mediatek processor and also has a separate Graphics Processing Unit for speed. Its a dual sim phone and can handle two GSM connections at the same time.
The operating system on the phone is not the latest from Google–it runs on Android Ice Cream Sandwich (v 4.0.4). This shouldn’t bother you so much because the difference isn’t as great as the difference between ICS and Honeycomb (v 3.2). However, there aren’t any phones running the latest version of Android (Jellybean v 4.2) at this price. If you are a new Android user, or upgrading from your feature phone, you will love it.
Compared to the previous version of the phone– the Micromax Superfone Canvas A100, this one has a better camera and processor. The A110 has an 8 MP camera and also a front facing camera for video calls.
Battery Life
To test the battery life, the first two days, we put the phone to some really heavy use. We clicked around 100 photographs and shared a few on Facebook. The data was on most of the time. We didn’t make too many calls on the phone but it wasn’t completely unused for calls. Played a few videos and some music in between and fiddled with it most of the time so the screen was on. The result? The battery lasts about three fourths of a day with fairly heavy usage as described.
If you are an average user, who uses e-mail, instant messaging, Facebook and a few other apps like the Kindle app, this phone easily lasts a day. i.e. If you start out with a fully charged phone in the morning, you don’t need to look for a power supply until you get back home. We don’t want to throw a lot of specs on you, but if you must have it, the phone has a Li-Ion, 2000 mAh battery which gives you 5 hours talktime and 180 hours on standby.
Pricing
Now, to the price: At around Rs 10k, the phone is a good looker and performer. You don’t end up feeling bad about spending the money because the manufacturer hasn’t cut too many corners– or at least none that makes it look like a crappy device. The phone looks quite classy, unlike the other phones out in the market. You might find some decent deals online, but there aren’t too many discounts on the phone as yet. With the bells and whistles, you are talking nearly Rs 11,000 for the phone. Though Samsung cut the price of its dual sim phone Galaxy S Duos recently, its still costlier than this phone by around Rs 3.5- 4.5k. It doesn’t look like Micromax will cut prices for the phone any time soon.
Cons
The phone hasn’t had any significant problems so far. However, its size and form factor might annoy a few. For instance, the phone will not nicely fit into your palm, even if you have a big hand. But once you get used to the screen size, you won’t go back to a smaller phone. The reading experience on the Kindle app or Flipboard on this phone is great.
While price wise, its not heavy on the pocket, size wise the phone won’t fit your pocket. You can’t stick it into your helmet either. Its a bit heavy compared to the Galaxy SII or the Note.
The speakers are behind the phone. So if you have laid the phone with the speaker side down, you might not hear the ringtone loud and clear. If you are used to iPod like sound through the earphones, you will be disappointed. This isn’t loud enough or clear enough, but it works.
The phone has only 2GB of internal memory so you might soon find yourself running out of space if you don’t have an external SD card. You can add a microSD card of up to 32 GB for more storage.
Key specs
5-inch LCD Capacitive Touchscreen
1 GHz Dual Core Processor
Expandable Storage Capacity of 32 GB
Android v4.0.4 (Ice Cream Sandwich) OS
8 MP Primary Camera
0.3 MP Secondary Camera
Dual SIM (GSM + GSM)
Wi-Fi
