Gold circuitry

Because gold doesnt deteriorate over time and is less prone to damage when coming into contact with other materials (ie water, other metals, air with contaminants).
Its more stable and therefore more reliable.
Gold is also resistive to abrasion where the contacts can move.
So gold plating can last a very long time with repeatable good results.

For metal to metal contacts, you cant beat copper to copper or silver to silver when they are new, but they dont remain new for long.
Copper corrosion has very low conductivity.
Some silver corrosion is conductive, some not. A plating will get thinner and less able to resist mechanical abrasion the more it corrodes.
 
I believe what makes Gold so nice is that it will oxide, but that the oxide is still conductive.

But what was really cool was back when the government did "cost no object" defense projects, they used extremely thin layers of gold in the canopy windows of various stealth planes to shield the cockpit from radiating electronic signals. Very cool stuff.

f22goldcockpit.jpg
 
That's also why a lot of computer chips are made with Aluminum and Copper inside the actual chip. Its much cheaper then gold, and the chip itself is a sealed environment. But they do use gold for the wires that connect the silicon chip to the "feet" on the outside of the computer chip package.
 
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