Symbian, the world’s most popular smartphone operating system, has announced that it’s going open source about four months ahead of schedule. This move will allow more software developers to have access to develop applications and mobile devices based on the operating system.

The plan was to complete the transition of putting the OS under the Eclipse development license and work out deals with existing third party developers by later this summer. Symbian was able to move ahead more quickly, most likely to try and keep an edge on the newer open-source Android mobile operating system from Google.

Samsung has just released not one or two, but four new handsetsin its mid-range phones series. The phones in question are the Samsung S6700, C5510, M2510 and M2310.

The M2310 comes with a sad VGA camera and the M2510 features a sad 1.3MP camera. Both have dedicated music controls. The Samsung C5510 is a dual band 3G handset that features a 2MP camera with fixed focus, and a 16GB storage capacity. While the Samsung S6700 is a slider with HSDPA, GPS, a 3MP camera with auto-focus and dual LED flash, and 120MB of storage space.

It looks like Samsung was ultra serious about releasing about a million touchscreen devices this year. Two more handsets have been leaked and despite the fact that they look exactly the same, they have some differences.

Both pack in a 240 x 400 resolution touchscreen and both have a home button. Their exteriors make them look like twins, but under the hood is where the differences are. We don’t know much about the S8000, but we do know it features a 5-megapixel camera with dual LED flash and autofocus. The M8000 also has the camera but is marketed toward the music-listening crowd with a music key on the screen and a 3.5mm headset jack.

Seeking a replacement solution to those old walkie-talkies you use around your large mansion has arrived in the form of some Wi-Fi enabled handsets. The Ascom i75 Messenger, though mainly targeted towards office and medical settings, could serve you well at home as well.

The Ascom i75 Messenger delivers what Ascom describes as “advanced messaging and highly versatile telephony as well as push to talk capabilities.” It has a virtual SIM-card which lets you hop from one handset to another in case of failure of the one you are using.