This ain’t your grandma’s phone. Heck, this ain’t even your phone. Rather, the Darling smartphone from ProTruly is either the phone of the future, or a bizarre idea that will fade away. Heralded as the first smartphone with a built-in 360-degree camera, the Darling certainly seems to have locked down a recipe for adoration from photo enthusiasts; but only those who do not mind an almost absurdly giant phone.
You see, having a 360-degree camera means sacrificing any semblance of stealth, or generally sleek design. Indeed, the world’s “first VR-taking phone,” as it’s described by China Daily News, has what The Verge called “an enormous camera protrusion on both the front and back.” And as you can see in the video, it’s a significant bump, one that may make sitting down with one of these devices in your back pocket somewhat uncomfortable.
The phone is also really quite long. That’s because the dual 13-megapixel fisheye lenses are connected to the phone’s top bezel.
As for other impressive specs, the Darling is actually a gold phone made of 3.08 grams of “pure gold,” as per ProTruly. Moreover, the phone just happens to have four diamonds tethered to a leather band on the Darling’s backside — we should point out, however, that the carat count of said diamonds is unclear.
Otherwise, the Darling comes with a 5.5-inch full HD resolution (1,920 x 1,080), runs Android 6.0 Marshmallow, is powered by a 2.5GHz deca-core Helio X20 MT6797 processor, and features 4GB of RAM. The phone also boasts 64GB of internal storage, and an impressive 3,560 mAh battery (because keeping up with a VR camera is hard work). Then there’s the headphone jack, USB-C, and fingerprint sensor in the home button.
It’s not entirely clear how much the phone is actually selling for, partially because there are two models, and partially because there are conflicting reports. The standard model, Mashable says, is $500, but China Daily claims the price is closer to $600. The souped-up (diamond-studded) version is either $800 or $1,300, according to the two respective publications.
So if you’re looking for a phone that will certainly catch someone’s eye, the Darling may be the phone for you.
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