Budget Smartphone Rival

Micromax A110 Canvas 2 vs Karbonn A21

The dual-core smartphones market is growing day by day. This week Micromax launched two brand new dual-core smartphones namely, A110 Canvas 2 and A90S. Both these phones have a dual-core processor clocked at 1 GHz. The A90S is priced higher than the A110 Canvas 2 at Rs.13,000, because A90S has some more features that are superior to the A110. It has an AMOLED screen, which is something that I’ve seen only in the high priced phones like Samsung Galaxy SII. Today I’m going to be comparing the Micromax A110 with the Karbonn A21. Karbonn A21 is a great dual-core smartphone and that too at a very affordable price. So let’s see how the A110 matched up with the Karbonn A21.

I liked the Micromax A110 very much by the looks of it. It looks similar to the Spice Stellar Horizon Mi-500, which looks very similar to the Galaxy Note. So I meant to say that it looks similar to the Galaxy Note. The 5-inch screen of the A110 is very attractive and the colors look great. I wasn’t satisfied with the resolution because it was just 480x854 pixels. Some people might think that it’s enough for a 5-inc display. But I beg to differ. The Karbonn A21 sports a 4.5 inch screen that has a qHD display. If a 4.5 inch phone can have a qHD display, why can’t a 5-inch phone have it? But it’s not much of an issue considering the fact that there is no problem with the clarity or anything of that sort. 


Coming to the hardware of these two phones, I think the Karbonn A21 has better hardware. It comes with a Qualcomm Scorpion ARMv7 dual-core processor clocked at 1.2 GHz and in addition to that it also has an Adreno 203 GPU. Adreno GPUs were famous at the time of their release but now they have lost their class. The GPUs perform less efficiently compared to their PowerVR compatriots. With that said, the Micromax A110 has a CoreMediaTek M6577 processor that is clocked at 1 GHz. It also has a PowerVR SGX 531 GPU. 

The A110 has 512 MB of RAM, of which 470 MB is available to the user with all the apps closed. This is something that disappointed me because I expected at least 768 MB of RAM. But comparing it with the Karbonn A21, it is good, because A21 too has only 512 MB of RAM of which only 380 MB is available to the user with all apps closed.

Both the phones have an internal memory of 4GB. A110has only 2.05 GB available to the user while the Karbonn A21 has around 3 GB available to the user. But this is not a major issue, as you can download the ApptoSD app and copy all of the apps in to your SD card without any trouble. Something else that caught my attention is the support for Bluetooth 3.0 in the Micromax A110. It is not available in the Karbonn A21. This ensures very fast file transfer, even when you are sending bigger files like movies. Both the phones have dual sim slots, where the 1^st slot is for the 3G sim and the next one is for the normal GSM sim.

The screens of both these phones are really magnificent. This is mainly because both of these phones have very large screens (5-inch and 4.5 inch respectively) and I think this is a very big positive that I’ve seen in the smartphones that are coming out nowadays. They all sport a great, big screen. Both the phones have a 5-point multi touch capacitative touch screen. This can be tested with Multi Touch app that you can download from the App Market. The A110 has an FWVGA screen with a resolution of 480x854. The resolution is great, but the Karbonn A21 has a better resolution and that too with the smaller screen. The A21 has a qHD display with a resolution of 960x540. It was initially stated that the A21 would have a 480x800 resolution, but it turns out to have a better display. This means that the Karbonn A21 will have a higher pixel density due to the small screen size and the higher resolution. This in turn means that you will have an enjoyable experience looking at pictures, playing games or watching videos (alone). One big advantage that the A110 has over the Karbonn A21 is the IPS display. 

The dpi i.e. pixel density is higher in A21 than A110, since a21 houses 960x 540 in 4.5inch screen whereas a110 is 800x400 in 5 inches screen. So in display Karbon A21 is better. Moreover, in respect to heating of the chips, qualcomm always decipates lesses heat w.r.t mediatek processors. I would justify you conclusion as featurewise: micromax a110 is the winner But quality wise karbonn is the winner.

This will take video watching experience to a whole new level. If you have a video that you want to show a bunch of friends, then you could show it to them without compromising with the video quality. Sadly, the Karbonn A21 doesn’t have an IPS display. But we will be hoping to see Karbonn incorporating this feature in to their next phone. I don’t know when they will launch their next phone, but I’m sure it’s going to be a great one, because every day we have better phones that are coming out in the market that are available to the common man.

Next up we have the camera. This is one of the many things that amazed me in the Micromax A110. It sports an 8 megapixel camera with dual-LED flash. Can you believe that? An 8 megapixel camera for less that Rs.11,000. I thought something like this would never happen in the next 10 years. But it has happened right in 2012. At first I thought it was a mistake that the company said. But then it really had an 8 megapixel camera(Just got printed but not upto 8mp quality). It comes will all the features that you can expect from a camera like autofocus, image editing, etc. In the front, I was disappointed again, because it only had a VGA camera(quite decent). I expected a 1.2 megapixel camera at least because the rear camera was not upto that expectation. In the Karbonn A21, there is a 5 megapixel rear camera, that too with a dual-LED flash. It also has features like auto focus, touch to focus, etc. In the front there is a 1.3 megapixel camera. This is something that impressed me a lot. Micromax took care of the rear camera but left out the front camera. But Karbonn has taken care of both the phones. You can take great photos with the 5 megapixel rear camera and you can use the front camera for high quality video calling using Skype.

The touch sensitivity of both the phones is just stunning. They are so flawless and smooth, it makes me want to touch and swipe at them all day long. I couldn’t stop myself from experiencing the smoothness of the touch display of both these phones. Added to that both of the phones come with Android 4.0.4, that is the Ice Cream Sandwich. This is a great addition to the excellent touch display. The ICS OS is just so user friendly and anyone would love to use it. 

The battery of the Micromax A110 is a 2000 mAh Li-Ion battery. The Karbonn A21 has an Li-Ion battery of 1800 mAh. Both these phones will last you for roughly the same time and the company promises a time of 5 hours, with 3G, Wi-Fi and a little bit of gaming. 

My Final Verdict: 

The final verdict of this battle might be different for people who are reading this .But for me there is a clear winner and it is the Micromax A110 Canvas 2(I personally own it and using it currently). I think Micromax was able to incorporate many of the essential things that needed to be there in a phablet and their sales show that. They are leading the budget smartphone market in India followed by Samsung.