Even as Micromax continues to bombard the market with its affordable, yet feature rich, smartphones, every once in a while it also comes out with a tablet or two for change. May be just to shake things up. Like its smartphones, its tablets too play in the budget segment. The Canvas Tab P690 is one such tablet.
Currently available at a price of Rs.9,790 (via Flipkart), the Micromax Canvas Tab P690 tablet supports 3G voice calling and comes with the promise of the Android Lollipop upgrade in future.
Having said that, the tablet market hasn't exactly picked up the way manufacturers would have liked. It's getting better with time though. One reason for this can be the gradual rise of affordable tablets. The budget segment now boasts of some good, if not downright amazing, tablets. This also means more competition. Is the Micromax Canvas Tab P690 up for the challenge? We find out.
The design and build quality of the Canvas Tab P690 can be considered decent at best. While it is entirely built of plastic, the company has tried to infuse a 'premium' element into it by the giving the back a brushed metal finish. While the finish does help to an extent, the fact that its top and bottom don't carry the same kind of finish feels odd.
We understand that Micromax is looking to break the monotony by keeping the middle part a distinct 'silvery' and the upper and lower ends stark black, sadly it doesn't work well for the P690. If Micromax had retained the uniformity by giving it a brushed metal finish throughout, it would have given the illusion that it's metal all the way, thus improving upon its 'premium' quotient. The two-tone colour scheme only accentuates the fact that it's plastic, all the way through.
But then, aren't all tablets in this price range (and upwards) made of copious amounts of plastic? Yes, but the likes of the Dell Venue 8, the Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 Neo and Asus' Fonepad tablets all look way better (both in design and build quality) in comparison.
The one area where the P690 shines though is its slim frame. At 7.8mm and 318 grams, the P690 is one of the slimmest tablets at its price. This means, while things may get slippery sometimes (since there's no matte finish on the back for extra grip), the P690 still is very easy to hold and operate, even with one hand. Micromax has also used the screen real estate well on this one. The slim bezels mean the size is fairly compact.
The Micromax Canvas Tab P690 comes with an 8-inch WXGA IPS display with an 800x1280 pixels resolution and 189 ppi pixel density. We were pretty satisfied with the display output of the P690. The display was fairly bright and colours looked good and well saturated for the greater part. Also, viewing angles were just adequate for a tablet in this price range.
That said, the P690 really struggles in outdoor environment, with the viewing angles greatly affected when you're out and about, especially because it reflects the light like a mirror. The screen is prone to smudge and fingerprints which accentuates this drawback further.
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