Zelfy Peel might be the iPhone remote you’ve been looking for

Our eyes were drawn to an FCC filing this morning from a California start-up by the name of Zelfy; a quick glance at Zelfy’s site reveals that they’re in “stealth mode,” but the picture of a woman using an iPhone to control her TV should give you an idea of what these guys are up to. Indeed, digging through the filing shows a product called “Peel” whose central component, the “Peel Fruit,” is a small, battery-powered sphere of an IR blaster that connects to your home network router. Next, you download the Peel app onto the iPhone (or iPod touch ) of your choice and control the Fruit over WiFi. The filing reveals little in the way of UI or functionality, but the product’s tagline is “every remote and TV guide now on your phone,” so we would assume that you’ll have access to your cable provider’s lineup and schedule from the app. More on this one just as soon as Zelfy decides to emerge from stealth mode, we suppose

O2′s HTC Desire gets official Froyo update — for a moment, anyhow

O2 UK has been a little late to the Desire’s Android 2.2 party , but of course, it’s a “better late than never” sort of situation — or is it? After getting a “small number” of reports that the just-released update for O2-branded units was causing problems, the carrier has put the software on ice for the moment; there appear to be several failure modes ranging from freezing to having Sense get stuck in a crash loop, but the net result is that there’s definitely some wonkiness with the binary O2′s put out so far. Though we imagine you can probably find an update.zip floating around, we’re not sure sure attempting an install is a hot idea — we might wait for this situation to get sorted first. In the meantime, here’s O2′s full statement in its official forums: “Hi all As some of you will have noticed the Android 2.2 Froyo update for HTC Desire on O2 went live this morning

Shocker: Huawei Ideos may be headed to T-Mobile

Huawei wants to bring Android to the masses , and it sounds like one cellular carrier may already be on board — the Wall Street Journal reports that T-Mobile is presently in talks to offfer the 2.8-inch, Android 2.2 smartphone and could begin selling it by Yuletide. Of course, considering China-based Huawei expects the reasonably-attractive device could cost as little as $100 off-contract , it’s not terribly surprising that any carrier you’d care to name would be champing at the bit to grab one. “It’s safe to assuming we’re talking to all of the major carriers,” a Huawei spokeswoman said. Shocker: Huawei Ideos may be headed to T-Mobile originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Sat, 04 Sep 2010 20:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds

LG Optimus One and Optimus Chic eyes-on

That “leaked” low-end LG Android device from a few days back? Turns out it was nothing more than the Optimus Chic, one of two Google-powered phones that the company announced back in early July. They’re still not ready to let us touch the damned things here at IFA — apparently on account of the fact that they’re not commercially available yet — but we got close enough to conclude that you definitely won’t be fooling anyone into thinking that you’ve dropped many hundreds of euros on your phone. You could argue that Huawei set the tone for IFA’s small-but-notable mobile presence this year with its introduction of the Ideos — in other words, cheap Android gear — and both of these LGs look primed to go head-to-head with the Ideos in that arena. Nokia had long been hoping to totally own the smartphone industry in emerging markets by driving S60 into the bargain basement — but with this latest round of Android releases coming dangerously close to the same price points, we could have an interesting battle on our hands.

Guitar Sidekick brings your phone to your guitar, while your guitar gently weeps

You may not want to be seen rocking one of these at your next gig, but if you’ve been trying to juggle your phone and guitar while using some of the endless number of apps out there, you might just want to consider this so-called Guitar Sidekick from Castiv. As you can see, there’s not a whole lot to it — just a bracket that attaches to the neck of your guitar, and an adjustable mechanism that will accommodate just about any smartphone (or even a PSP). No word on an iPad version just yet, but you can grab this one right now for $30. Guitar Sidekick brings your phone to your guitar, while your guitar gently weeps originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 03 Sep 2010 10:42:00 EST.

Windows Phone 7 goes gold master, begins rolling out to partners for final launch preparations

If you’ve been holding yourself back during these early rounds of the smartphone wars in anticipation of Windows Phone 7 , your wait just got a tiny bit shorter. Today Microsoft is announcing that its fancy new mobile operating system has been released to manufacturing, making the idea of you holding an actual WP7 device in your hands that much closer to reality. The finished product is now rolling out to partners around the world where it will be getting carrier and manufacturer tweaks and additions, and going through the kind of pre-launch testing you would expect for a release of this scale. If you had any doubt that the Windows Phone 7 onslaught was close at hand , feel free to abandon them now. Furthermore, the folks on the 7 team have managed to cram a few last minute goodies into the OS, one of which we’re particularly excited about

LG’s C900 Windows Phone 7 handset resurfaces with 1.3GHz Snapdragon, metal frame? (video)

We imagine that LG’s security forces are combing Poland as we speak, because Android.com.pl has just provided us with yet another high-end handset leak. This LG C900 (last seen combing AT&T trenches ) reportedly joins LG’s E900 in housing a 1.3GHz QSD8650A Snapdragon chipset under its sliding-QWERTY hood. Though our first look at the device suggested a plasticky matte frame, our erudite Polish informants tell us the phone’s mostly metal inside — despite a comparatively teensy 3.2-inch capacitive screen, they say it weighs about as much as an original Motorola Droid . A 3.5mm jack and a miniUSB port will play nice with headsets and charging cables respectively, and the site says it’ll run 1,100 zloty (about $350) if or when LG’s marketers recover from the shock of these leaked details and decide to ship. Find a video after the break and a host of similarly excellent pictures at our source link.

Samsung Fascinate ready for Best Buy in-store pre-order ahead of rumored September 9 launch

Verizon can’t be feeling too hot about being the straggler to the Galaxy S party , but the wait seems to be almost at an end. Best Buy’s just started taking in-store pre-orders for the Fascinate , while the latest internal document leak from VZW indicates a specific September 9 launch for the 4-inch Android handset. That’s when you should be able to snap the Fascinate up along with a prepaid data plan from Big Red, which fits in nicely with earlier unsanctioned disclosures on the matter. Either way, Samsung’s quest to conquer all networks with its Super Gorilla phone will be coming to a victorious end pretty soon.

T-Mobile G2 build flashes to other devices to great results, new widgets

Remember that T-Mobile G2 build that leaked out earlier this week? Even if you didn’t, the ROM still managed to find its way onto other Android devices by way of some clever (if not elementary, dear Watson) hacking, and from that very binary comes some vivid imagery. Nothing too surprising or earth-shattering, unless of course you find a Google Voice widget absolutely mind-blowing. And if you do, well, you’re welcome. T-Mobile G2 build flashes to other devices to great results, new widgets originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 Aug 2010 13:33:00 EST

Vodafone teases with exclusive green Nokia N8, still mum on prices and availability

With September just a few days away, things are really about to get real for Nokia’s flagship N8 , especially in Europe . For instance, Vodafone’s UK arm has just updated the “Coming Soon” page for this Symbian^3 device. What’s new? Just the fact that the carrier will be offering the phone in two colors: black and green, with the latter ironically exclusive to red Vodafone. Yep, that’s pretty much it — no prices or dates mentioned just yet, but we’ll be keeping an eye out for you N8 believers.

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CellPhone Latest

• ARM reveals Eagle core as Cortex-A15, capable of quad-core computing at up to 2.5GHz
• T-Mobile G2 comes out from hiding, pre-orders begin later this month
• BlackBerry App World crosses the 10,000 app mark
• White HTC Desire and silver Wildfire make a special appearance in London
• Rogers gets real with Android 2.1 updates for HTC Magic+, Samsung Galaxy Spica
• TomTom offers free iPhone 4 adapter for Car Kit
• Mobilicity takes Rogers to task over Chatr, alleges it’s using a ‘flanker brand’
• Google Instant on a Motorola Droid 2, hands-on
• T-Mobile throws in up to three extra lines for free on family plans
• QuickPay announces ROAMpay credit card swiper for Android, BlackBerry, iOS
• iOS 4.1 is live, available to download right now
• Samsung Galaxy S keeps up global offensive with three Chinese launches
• Qualcomm: 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon devices to arrive at end of 2011, 1.2GHz in Q1
• Polish operator Mobyland jumps straight from 2G to LTE
• Qualcomm demos augmented reality app for digital photo frames (video)
• Video: Samsung i5700 Galaxy Spica now with multitouch support