The iPhone’s silent mode isn’t “silent enough” for many people. If you hold your beloved smartphone on a hard surface, it will create a rattling noise often times more disruptive than a normal audible tone. To prevent this annoyance, Apple is patenting a new way that will make future iPhones “more silent.”
The company’s patent application shows us the way Cupertino folks envision this. The phone will monitor audible sound levels generated by a phone’s vibrator and adjust the [vibrating] mechanism accordingly, even shutting down vibrations completely and replacing it with smooth audible tones.
The filing covers two types of haptic devices, or vibrators, used in modern smartphones – rotating and oscillating linear vibrators. Devices using the former vibrator have an eccentric weight attached to a spinning drive shaft, while the latter method relies on magnetic force to drive a weight back and forth…
It’s unclear when the first iPhone sporting this technology will be unveiled, but boy, do we find the vibration annoying from time to time…
[Via: AppleInsider]