Patent ID: 6879822

Claim:
A system comprising: a cell phone having an antenna and a speaker; an answering machine integrated with the cell phone; and a nonvolatile memory region coupled to the answering machine to store an audio signal of an incoming call received via the antenna and answered by the answering machine, the cell phone including a codec to process the audio signal of the incoming call and the codec including a demultiplexer having an input, a first output, a second output, and a third output, the input being coupled to the antenna to receive the audio signal of the incoming, the first output being coupled to the nonvolatile memory region to store the audio signal in the nonvolatile memory region if the incoming call is not picked up within a predetermined period of time, and an audio decompressor having an output, a first input, a second input, and a third input, the output being coupled to the speaker, the first input being coupled to the third output of the demultiplexer, the second input being coupled to the second output of the demultiplexer, the third input being coupled to the nonvolatile memory region, the audio decompressor decompressing the audio signal of the incoming call received via one of the first and second inputs from the demultiplexer and routing via the output the decompressed audio signal to the speaker if the incoming call is picked up within the predetermined period of time.