Microsoft Patent App Shows Slider Smartphone With Removable Accessories

If I had to stand back and think hard, I wouldn't say that Microsoft has very rarely come up with something really cool. The Xbox 360 is as close as I can think of to an interesting invention by the software giant. A new patent app has surfaced that shows a very cool smartphone that has a slider design and under the main screen has a slot for different accessories.

The idea is that the phone could slide out had have accessories that are made for specific tasks. One is a remote control for media from across the room, the other appears to be a battery, and there are keyboard and what appears to be a video accessory as well. The downside and thing that would make this not so cool is that you would need to carry all those accessories with you to be able to use them on the road.

In the world of touchscreens today it seems the easier and more practical approach would be a thin removable LCD of some sort in that slot that can virtually act as all those accessories. Granted for some uses real buttons are better than virtual ones. I would totally go for a smartphone like this that had one display to act as everything for on the go, but an accessory for gaming with real controls and sticks. I wonder if this is one of those patents that is intended to simply keep other firms from making something without paying fees to Microsoft. Since they don't make hardware, I don't see this coming to market.

[via UnwiredView]