Surround sound from the phone?

(Credit: M8Cool.com)

In the shotgun wedding between mobile phones and MP3 players, some handsets are trying to seize the upper hand by including larger speakers in their slender frames. The recently discovered "Super Audio Phone" from China, for example, has a speaker that makes it look something like an old-fashioned transistor radio.

Another model from Hong Kong is aiming to go a step further with several small built-in speakers to create 7.1 surround sound, according to Pocket-lint. Regardless of how well (or poorly) they perform, at least we know that they won't look as awkward as some snap-on alternatives on the market. Or you can skip the music/phone combo idea altogether and go with a boombox.