[poetic_folly]

Apple has filed a patent for a method of placing photovoltaic cells underneath an LCD touch screen, which would give them a great opportunity to maximize that 3.5 inch screen on the iPhone.

According to the filing, the solar power info could be displayed either on the solar cells themselves, or on the device itself near the rest of the stats such as battery power, message alerts, etc.

Solar powered phones could change that constant need to find a plug, USB cable, or extra battery, and instead give way to people all requesting window offices. Smoke breaks replaced by charging breaks. Sucks for those of you who live in depressingly grey cities like my hometown of Seattle.

Forbes (thanks, arash)

[iancdp]

Now thats worth wasting money for

[Aiyo]

whoa thats awesome! Hello longer battery life.

[alerx7]

That Ill Be An Extra 300 Buck Apple Will Charge U For Beside The Phone

[Reako]

Oh wow. That's gonna be intense.

Reako

[GregTheWang]

This. Is. Absolutely. Pointless.

Seriously, how long do you have to put this out in the sun to power a battery eating monster of a jailbroken iPhone?

[Dust Busta]

Hopefully once this comes out I wont have to charge my phone every night.


Too bad my phones hardly ever in light.

[iamilya77]

Awesome.....

i posted this in the chit chat place yesterday

[sn0ws]

thats sweet I could see this being really handy in some situations and shouldn't be dubbed as pointless just because it wouldn't fit into your life right now... I could see this being great for backpacking/camping situations. I would def. spring the extra for the ability to take my iPhone on a backpacking trip to Isle Royal and know that I wouldn't have to leave it off until an emergency situation.

just my two cents!

[m3thodandr3d]

LOL. Now I'm gonna have to walk down the street holding my iPhone instead of leaving it in my pocket. Isn't it something like, 1 hour of sunlight is 25 minutes of talk time? I don't see that being very benificial for me to have my iPhone in the scorching heat in direct sunlight for an hour....it'll probably melt the LCD or something.

[DarkoNova]

Originally Posted by m3thodandr3d

LOL. Now I'm gonna have to walk down the street holding my iPhone instead of leaving it in my pocket. Isn't it something like, 1 hour of sunlight is 25 minutes of talk time? I don't see that being very benificial for me to have my iPhone in the scorching heat in direct sunlight for an hour....it'll probably melt the LCD or something.

Yeah, it's something like 20-30% of actual sunlight gets used as power. Solar energy is extremely inefficient, so even though this is a cool idea, I don't see it being that useful.

Matt

[kys]

Just wondering if you'll be able to see the screen in the sunlight?

[mbrooksr]

theyre not saying that the solar panel would be used as a primary energy souce.

but id love to have my iphone run for a while longer without charging.

[Treeml]

actually if they are using the new nanosolar technology which is amazingly efficient, it may indeed be practical Nanosolar - The Third Wave of Solar Power

[mwr_allen]

This is amazing, up until the iPhone was released the typical mobile phone was very slow in making new breakthroughs but in a just the short time of the iPhone look at whats been acheived.

Great thanks to all you modders for all your tireless work.

I cant wait to see whats next.