Last Updated on August 30, 2015 by Mathew Diekhake
Right from the get-go I knew there was something not quite right about the OnePlus One smartphone. Call it blogger intuition, but after a convincing launch where I ate my words, it seems now that it is time for shipments to commence that they have left the cat out of the bag.
It seems to buy one of these handsets you first need an invitation to order one. No, this is not a dinner for high rollers, but rather a way of keeping up with supply and demand needs. The founder of the company has thought this was a good idea, and while I am nor here or there about it, there’s little doubt that masses of people are confused to buggery. I will tear it down for all of you the best I can.
There is an invite system that stops people just ordering at will. OnePlus will randomly send out a batch of invites. If a person receives one of these invites then he/she can either choose to accept it or pass it on to someone they know who wants to use it instead. When a person finally does order a smartphone with the golden ticket they then choose 1 other person to hand the invite on to next. This chain will keep going until either OnePlus stay stop or everybody has their mobiles.
To me that is nonsense that nobody wants to partake in and hopefully it is gone in 12 months time. However, it is only happening because they have no choice. If they make enough money through sales presumably this scheme is thrown out the window next time. Our guess is that because of the commotion it has caused on the official OnePlus One forum they will scrap this next year regardless.
If you want some device information while you wait, this mobile has Android 4.4 CyanogenMod 11S UI for an operating system. It comes with the physical dimensions of 6.02 x 2.99 x 0.35 inches and weighs only 162 grams. The display is hugely coming in at 5.5-inches. That is bigger than both of the HTC One M8 and the Samsung Galaxy S5. It will also be larger than the iPhone 6. Although there’s no iPhone 6 confirmation at this stage we are confident in our sources. To go with a big screen is a screen resolution of 1080 x 1920 pixels combined with a pixel density of barely over 400. It is backed with some good IPS LCD technology and has a 13 megapixel rear camera. Of course, there is fast mobile data support 4G and NFC thrown in for good measure plus a bevy of other features to boot.
You can view the story in full at the forum posted by the team here.