The US Patent Office has approved a new patent submitted by Apple some time back that involves an iPhone and another device that looks amply like a MacBook, but with a difference.
Much like Samsung’s upcoming new technology shared by Roland Quandt recently, it looks like the iPhone 8 could also get a similar system, though it could be much more elaborate. The device that we can see accompanying the iPhone in the leaked pictures is a laptop that is more like a dummy shell. It does come with a functional display as well as a keyboard area, but the portion where the trackpad is generally located actually holds a docking station.
However, the docking mechanism is designed differently compared to other devices. Instead of standing upright, the iPhone will be lying flat inside the dock, presumably to power the device. The idea is to power the shell using the processors and RAM of the iPhone. Besides enabling users to be able to carry around a laptop that is much lighter than traditional MacBooks, the technology could also provide with a graphics and battery boost.
Interestingly enough, the same technology could also be developed for the iPad, but in this case, the mechanism will be different. In the second figure, one can see that the iPad will be docked in the area where the display is usually located in a laptop. What this means is that the tablet’s display will serve as the display of the shell, thus enabling it to become a complete computing device.
Like all things unconfirmed, there is no guarantee that this technology will find its way into the iPhone 8, but considering that Apple may have some interesting things to introduce in their anniversary edition smartphone, it is not entirely impossible.
