Steve Cote: Nokia Oro: A C7 with added bling

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Nokia Oro: A C7 with added bling

Just what you wanted, a gold plated Nokia phone
Nokia Oro: A C7 with added bling. phones, mobile phones, Nokia, Nokia C7, Nokia Oro 0

The Nokia / Windows Phone 7 partnership can't come soon enough it seems. For at the moment the only phones that seem to be dropping from Nokia towers are either good, but a year or so late (see the N8), or massively out of touch with the Nokia audience - see the recently announced Nokia Oro.

The Oro is basically the C7 in fancy clothes. It's a smartphone covered in 18-carat gold plating and boasting leather from "one of Scotland’s finest Caledonian herds".

Nokia's materials designer Robert Lihou said: “Our aim was to use the best materials for the purpose. It’s coated with 18-carat gold which has been made scratch-resistant. The leather is from premium Scottish stock. That’s a real sapphire crystal in the home key, which makes it eight times sturdier than glass.”

Now, we know there's people out there daft enough to part with silly money for tacky handsets. But for a blinged up Nokia C7? We're not so sure.

If you do fancy the Oro though, you'll be getting a Symbian handset (running Anna) with a 3.5-inch AMOLED display, an 8-megapixel camera (with 720p video shooting) and a bill in the post for at least €800, probably more. Ouch.