The Movil MC100 enters the long list of dual-SIM multimedia phones, trying to grab the market share in the entry level domain. Marketing the “3D-YAMAHA power amplifier” as its top selling point in the multimedia domain, the Movil MC100 stirs up level-headed competition against the likes of Fly phone theatre MV135, which we have reviewed earlier. Topping it up with the touch-screen interface and widget applications, it makes a strong statement amidst the cut-throat competition in the mobile market today. So, if not anything it should give you some sleepless nights thinking about making that ultimate decision of buying one of these value for money cellphones.

For starters, it is a bit bulkier, trying to accommodate a higher capacity battery with a rating of 1350mAh and expected to deliver a factory rated standby-time of up to 280 hrs. It is well built, with a steel metallic coated plastic strip reinforcing the contours of the front panel and a black glossy finish decorating the keypad and the edges of the LCD screen. The ring structured navigation-control dial at the top of the keypad has a brushed steel metallic finish, that matches with the rectangular strip encasing the LCD screen and the keypad layout. The steel metallic finish on the media control buttons and the chrome-textured finish on the battery cover add a touch of class to the design aesthetics of the cellphone. Also, the textured glossy black finish on the top and bottom surface of the cellphone, presents a nice contrast against the steel versus chrome finish on the contours of the front and back-panels respectively. There is a 3.2MP camera located at the top-centre of the back-panel and two pairs of indented holes on either side, located at the lower portion of the back-panel represent the “3D-YAMAHA power amplifier” speakers.

The keypad layout mainly constitutes the ring structured navigation-control dial enclosing a circular select button and six strips of keys arranged in six rows, with narrow ridges separating one row from the other. We felt the striped keypad design more convenient for typing, as it provided enough room for comfortable finger navigation and access to the right keys. Also, the ergonomic keypad design yielded consistent tactile feedback and good response to the user input. Thereby, providing superior control over typing accuracy and avoiding the need to register the input multiple times.

However, the touch-screen interface is quite buggy and fails to register the input sometimes, particularly while unlocking the keypad lock. The review piece did not ship with the stylus making it absolutely difficult to use the touch-screen keypad and so we had type out the entire text in the old-fashioned way. Also, we could not calibrate the stylus and test its precision. The touch-screen has an intuitive widget interface representing the home screen side bar and a rich assortment of widgets including date, time, calendar, media player, memo, alarm, FM radio and SMS/call log list.

Read on to know the performance, conclusion, performance test results, ratings and more in the next page...

• Dual-SIM (GSM+GSM); Display: 3-inch TFT, Resolution: 240 x 400, Colours: 262K
• Memory: microSD expandable up to 8GB
• Battery: 1350mAh, Talk-time: 4.5 hours, Standby-time: 280 hours