Verizon might be throwing most of its weight behind the Motorola Droid and its promise of delivering an anti-iPhone experience to all who embrace it, leaving the Droid Eris to basically fend for itself. The Droid Eris is essentially Verizon’s version of the HTC Hero, which made a big splash on Sprint’s network not too long ago. But, because it runs on the older Android 1.5 OS, it just doesn’t get the same attention that bigger brother Droid enjoys. But, that will all soon change. Verizon has announced that the HTC Droid Eris will be getting an Android 2.0 or Android 2.1 update sometime in the first quarter of 2010.
The new Android update will bring Google Maps Navigation’s free turn-by-turn GPS nav service to the Droid Eris next year, but it’s not yet clear if the Eris will get Android 2.0 or 2.1. We do know HTC is working on Android 2.1 for the HTC Hero, complete with the finger-happy Sense UI, so if the timing is right, the Eris may soon be playing with Android 2.1’s Google Maps Navigaion and skinned with the Sense UI.
Either way, a Droid Eris with at least Android 2.0 in tow could help push the Eris out to Android hopefuls that can’t do without Google Maps Navigation.
[Via: InformationWeek]