HTC announced that it will update the HTC Hero and the Droid Eris, the Verizon version of the HTC Hero to Android 2.1 next month. HTC previously emailed HTC Hero customers that they would be getting an update to Eclair 2.0, Android Eclair 2.1 has some more features.
The update to 2.1 brings with it more advanced Android features with a pinch zoom for photo album. Another new feature is Google's navigation service, that gives spoken turn-by-turn directions, formerly only found on the Droid by Motorola and Nexus One.
Android OS 2.1 has speech-to-text, you can enter text in any text field by speaking it out loud into the Droid Eris or HTC Hero. If you tried voice search, it's like voice search except, it fills in the text form with your spoken words.
The web browser has been updated. There is better camera software, and enhanced weather and news widgets in Android 2.1. The HTC Hero recently won "Best Handset" from GSMA at Mobile World Congress.
HTC Touch Sense also has been updated. It lets you use multi-touch
gestures to pinch-to-zoom to the web browser, and adds some additional
homescreen widgets.
A new Touch Sense feature is FriendStream, that brings together all your friends in - Facebook, Twitter, Flikr and email.
Verizon recently reduced the price of the Droid Eris to $79.99, if you buy one you get one free. An added bonus is a special $50 off Wireless and Mobile News coupon-link.
The price of the Droid Eris has been lowered to $79.99 with a contract. The Droid Eris by HTC has also gotten great reviews.
The Droid Eris by HTC came in fourth place in our Top Ten Best Smartphones of 2009 review. It has 528MHz Qualcomm processor, a 320×480 screen, and Android 1.5. This touchscreen-only smartphone also has HTC enhanced Touch Sense UI,
visual voicemail, Wi-Fi, MS Exchange Sync, Media Uploader (for
Facebook, Flickr, Picas, Gmail,) Google services, news widgets, and
Footprints, Geo-tagging for photos. The HTML Browser supports Flash Lite. The Droid Eris by HTC comes with 8 GB MicroSD card, Bluetooth, 5 megapixel camera.