Patent ID: 7869768

Claim:
A method for controlling speaker volume of a speaker of a portable communications device, the method comprising: continuously receiving an environmental signal from an environmental microphone of the portable communications device; identifying a level of environmental noise based on the environmental signal; and adjusting the speaker volume of the speaker of the portable communications device based on the identified level of environmental noise; wherein the portable communications device is a wireless phone device; the step of continuously receiving the environmental signal from the environmental microphone of the portable communications device includes obtaining, as the environmental signal from the environmental microphone, an electronic signal indicative of environmental noise in the vicinity of the wireless phone device; the step of identifying the level of environmental noise based on the environmental signal includes measuring the volume of the environmental noise represented by the environmental signal from the environmental microphone; wherein the wireless phone device is a cellular telephone having, as the speaker, a cellular telephone speaker to output an audio signal into an ear of a user; the step of adjusting the speaker volume includes automatically modifying a strength of the audio signal to enable the user to hear the audio signal when the ear of the user is adjacent the cellular telephone speaker; wherein the cellular telephone further includes a voice microphone which is different than the environmental microphone; receiving voice input from the user through the voice microphone of the cellular telephone, and conveying the voice input to another communications device which is external to the cellular telephone; the step of identifying the level of environmental noise includes identifying the level of environmental noise as a measured noise level; and the step of automatically modifying the strength of the audio signal includes: outputting the audio signal, via the speaker, at a preset value above the measured noise level; and holding the strength of the audio signal outputted by the speaker to be greater than the measured noise level by the preset value, the strength of the audio signal remaining in locked step above the measured noise level as the volume of the environmental noise changes with time.