14 DAY TRIAL // The OnePlus One smartphone is a rare orchid in the garden of smartphones. For starters, it’s extremely difficult to get your hands on one of these handsets.
For the time being, the producing company has a limited stock of phones, and to become eligible for receiving the privilege of paying for a OnePlus One, you are in need of a fancy invitation allowing you to place an order. It sounds like you’re auditioning for a spot on the Order of the Dragon council, doesn’t it?
Pre-orders for the handset will open up soon
Anyway, if you haven’t managed to get into the ranks of the elite until now, don’t despair. The startup seems to have resolved its production issues and has announced it will open the gates for everyone who wants to place an order for this “exclusivist” smartphone starting late October. Well, sort of.
You’d better mark the dates in your calendar, because even as the gates open, they will close so quickly you won’t even have time to ask “what’s going on?”
How things are actually going to unfold
For a limited time, the startup will accept unlimited orders for the OnePlus One. If you’re lucky and the company has the smartphone in stock, it will ship it out to you immediately.
If not, well, you’re in for quite a wait, but at least your name will be added to the donor list, oh scratch that, we mean pre-order list.
OnePlus hasn’t said how many items will be offered for purchase, but chances are that, if lots and lots of people want to get their hands on the fancy smartphone, you’ll have to be patient. Very patient.
However, if you’re bored with waiting for your exclusive smartphone to arrive and you want to put the money to better use, you’ll have the chance to ask the company for a refund.
The OnePlus One smartphone generated quite a hype ever since it was first announced and that’s mostly due to its promotional strategy.
As you can see, there are very few units of the smartphone available and the company is relying on mouth-to-mouth buzz, instead of a fully-fledged advertising campaign.
The smartphone is selling for pretty much what it costs to make it, which is $299 / €231. For this amount of money, customers receive a 5.5-inch handset with full HD resolution (1920 x 1200 pixels), a Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor and 3GB of RAM.
It’s also worthy to note that OnePlus One has started receiving the Android 4.4.4 KitKat update since August, which brings a whole host of bug fixes and improvements.
Watch out for the end of October and maybe you’ll be lucky enough to get your hands on this premium handset.