Gold mania grips smartphones

It seems that the famous James Bond villian Auric Goldfinger isn’t the only one who is crazy about gold-coloured everything. Soon after Apple launched the iPhone 5s, the golden hue seems to have become the colour of the season. While the “budget” iPhone was expected to steal the show this year, it is clearly the gold variant of the iPhone 5s that has emerged as the winner. It has been wiped clean off the shelves, and is already facing a supply shortage. Following Apple, some of its arch rivals have adopted the colour gold for their devices. Let’s take a quick look at some of the new and old phones dipped in gold.

Apple iPhone 5s

 iPhone 5S gold variant steals the show

It was in August that we first heard about the gold iPhone 5s in works, and it has been garnering a lot of attention since then. The thought on everyone’s mind was – gold-coloured iPhone could look tacky, but Apple has managed to pull it off pretty well, maintaining the aesthetics and sophistication that we’d seen in the iPhone 5.  It isn’t just about looks, as the iPhone 5s packs in an all-new A7 chip, 8 megapixel iSight camera, dual LED flash, a fingerprint scanner and up to 13 LTE  wireless bands. It is available in the US for $199 for the 16GB model and $299 for the 32GB model and $399 for the 64GB model. It is likely to reach India during November-December festive period. Our suggestion to Apple, launch it during Dhanteras and watch it fly off the shelves. 

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Samsung Galaxy S4

Samsung dips Galaxy S4 in gold

Apple’s arch-rival, Samsung, has also ensured that its customers too get a taste of gold. The company now offers its Galaxy S4 in gold. But it isn’t just plain ‘ol gold; Samsung now offers two variants of the Galaxy S4 - Gold Brown and Gold Pink. Though there is no confirmation about the internals of the new S4 Gold Edition, it can be assumed that Samsung will be sticking to the same specifications sheet as seen in the original device. A quick recap of its specs shows a 5-inch full HD Super AMOLED display with a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels. Under the hood, it gets a Exynos 5 Octa SoC and 2GB of RAM. 

HTC One

HTC One gets 24-carat gold treatment 

HTC also goes for gold with its One model. This isn’t the first time the company adds colour to the One. We’ve previously seen red and blue variants of the One. However, unlike the iPhone 5S and Galaxy S4, the One get 24-carat gold treatment. Yes, it’s a premium real-gold edition and available for pre-order through Gold Genie. The 32GB model of the special-edition costs £1,895 (approx. Rs 1,90,127). The platinum version of HTC One is available for £2,095 (approx. Rs 2,10,193) while the rose gold edition is priced at £1,995 (approx. Rs 2,00,160). Following the HTC One, its younger sibling, the One mini has also been spotted donning a golden case but there is no word on the price and availability.

While the fascination to own a gold device seems to be catching up now, it isn’t really something new. Apart from luxury device designers like Stuart Hughes and others, we’ve also seen companies come with phones with the golden shade. 

Nokia 8800

Blast from the past

Back in 2006, Nokia had launched the 8800 Sirocco Edition in gold. But the Finnish mobilemaker didn’t stop there. They went on to launch the 24ct gold plated version of the 8800 Sirocco, which was the most expensive Nokia device then. The company then crafted the Nokia 8800 Arte in gold, which was an updated version of the 8800. Its spec sheet may sound really mediocre now and the phone clearly doesn’t deserve the smartphone tag but the whole package was very radical in the pre-iPhone era. The phone included a 2.0 inch scratch resistant OLED screen, 4GB internal memory and 3.15 MP camera with autofocus.

Sony Xperia P

Sony embarked on the gold project

More recently, in December 2012, Sony had also announced the Project: 24K Gold Xperia P. The gold-coated, 24-carat version was also given off as a prize in a contest. We seriously doubt anyone took notice of how enticing a gold shade would look on phones then. The Sony Xperia P sports a 4-inch display and was powered by a 1GHz dual-core processor with 1GB RAM and internal storage of 16GB. It came equipped with an 8 megapixel shooter.

We’ve often seen herd mentality in the tech industry, and the new fascination for golden shade isn’t any different. As the festive season approaches we wouldn’t be surprised to see more phones dipped in gold crop up.