Many were initially quite excited about the new MicroSD support in Windows Phone 8 that was announced at the WP Summit in June. Fans of the platform will remember the headaches associated with the original Samsung Focus's MicroSD card slot -- the only Windows Phone with a user-accessible slot at the time -- so we breathed a sigh of relief when we learned it would be officially supported in future handsets. So far we know that in WP8 you can use a MicroSD card to expand the phone's memory as well as the ability to distribute and install apps. But is there more to the feature than we know?

WPDang's sources say yes, and claim that Windows Phone 8 will finally include a highly-requested feature: USB mass storage mode. In the roughly translated article, WPDang says that users will have direct access to the phone's file system and be able to drag-and-drop media files like photos, videos and music. They also say Windows Phone 8 devices will no longer require a dedicated syncing client like Zune to manage files, and even go on to describe the View Files option when you connect a WP8 device to a PC.

Interestingly the report mentions that Windows Phone 8 will support the "storage mode of the Symbian platform". We're not completely sure if WPDang was just comparing the new mass storage mode to past Symbian devices, or if they meant a native file browser or, more interestingly, USB On-The-Go. The latter was found in Symbian flagships and let a user connect a USB device (like a thumb drive) directly to a phone, giving them access to the drive's folders and files (watch a demo video here).

We're going to assume they were only referring to mass storage and nothing more, mostly because we know Microsoft is unlikely to give users that much free access to their devices. (After all, they do have piracy concerns to deal with.) Hopefully we'll get a confirmation of this feature soon from Microsoft themselves, but until then take it with some skepticism.

Source: WPDang (Translated)