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Mumbai: If you've been wondering how the office errands boy has a phone much swankier than yours, here's a newsflash, it's a Chinese phone!

The M Phone MT339, well that's what the box says, looks good and most importantly, stylish. The phone is neat and well finished unlike a few of its Chinese siblings that you may see floating around. So, we help you decide whether you should invest in one:

SCREEN
The screen is bigger than a Sony Ericsson P1i (2.2x1.5 inches to be precise) with 320x240 pixels (as good as the P1i) and of course, it's a touch screen. Superb picture quality and great screen resolution is the best thing about this phone. Use the stylus to write an SMS and it is promptly typed on the screen. This 'handwriting' feature is found only in high end phones like the P1i

Two Sim cards at the same time
This means you can make and receive calls from both your numbers without having to carry two phones thanks to the sim 1 and sim 2 calling buttons. With a different memory for the sim cards and your phone, it can store about 300 messages on the phone (150 for each sim) plus whatever your individual sim capacity. You can have different settings for both the sims and can even set different ringtones and SMS alerts for each sim card

Sound
The sound of this phone is incredible and quite clear. Though I would not say it's as clear as a Sony, it is definitely louder. It could easily put the old tape recorder to shame

Battery and charger
The lifeline of this phone is a 3.7 V 2800 mAh Li-ion battery which is huge. The battery backup is definitely better than the iconic Sony Ericsson W 550i in economy mode. At the flick of a button on the side, you can switch into economy mode. (This means your screen brightness and phone volume will be considerably reduced.) Without being in economy mode, the phone will last well in excess of two days, but of course, this may vary. The charger is a 100-240 VDC 50/60Hz 200 mA. The USB cable is the wire for the charger. This means that there is no separate charger and USB. Rather, the USB cable port joins an adapter to become the charger. Disconnect the cord and what you have is your USB cable. Some brainwave!

Size and Price
Its dimensions being 4.5x2.1x0.8 inches, the phone is big and slightly heavy. The weight would probably be one of its few drawback. Here's the big question What's the price? This model costs Rs 4,500, while you could get the basic music phone for as low as Rs 2,500. And if you've been eyeing the iPhone, but are broke, you could opt for its Chinese substitute which costs a humble Rs 7,000.

Conclusion
This phone is a steal all right, but remember, there is no warranty. If anything goes wrong, simply dump it because as of now, a Chinese phone repaired is unheard of. At the same time, you can flaunt a fully loaded phone at the price of an ordinary branded phone with no features.