Verizon's HTC Droid Eris to run Android 1.5 on a 528MHz CPU
By Nilay Patel 
posted Oct 27th 2009 5:11PM
posted Oct 27th 2009 5:11PM
We can certainly understand why Verizon wants to brand all of its Android devices under the "Droid" label, but at this point we can't say we understand why it's launching the HTC Droid Eris alongside the Motorola Droid at all -- BGR says it's going to run Android 1.5 on a 528MHz Qualcomm CPU, which means it'll be instantly obsoleted by Android 2.0 on the Moto's OMAP3 at launch. What's more, it sure seems like Verizon knows it's mismanaging this situation, as we haven't heard a single peep about the Eris in the runup to the Droid launch tomorrow, even though Eric Schmidt and Lowell McAdam were waving both devices around a few weeks ago. We'll see how this all plays out -- HTC certainly has Android 2.0 phones of its own in the works, so the Eris might not be long for this world.
HTC! cmon out with the dragon already!!
Tell me about it. I'm pretty sure everyone knew the re-re-released hero*cough* I mean eris was going to be a wash.
I need some Passion news asap so I can justify not jumping at the Droid on launch day (which happens to be my birthday). I was all ready for the Droid until I heard the Passion teaser rumor.
Talk about a Must-Not Buy.
No one should buy another phone from HTC with that 528Mhz processor. It's the only way to stop them.
I'm an Htc fan but that comment was funny when I read it.....+1 for your sir....i'm still irked that Htc put that processor in the Hero and then didn't get the Europe versions stateside....
seriously...fugg dis shiet. so sick of HTC and that 528 crap. one of the few reasons i thought about boycotting the tilt 2. but my tilt is waaaay too long in the tooth to wait for winmo7
I think it will be good to offer the Eris also. As long as the price fits. A Sholes/Droid for me.
disappointing...
528MHz?
NEXT!
laaaaaame, what's the screen size on this?
3.2 inches. For your health.
That's smaller than my Zune HD's screen!
So not worth it XD.
Not everyone likes sliders...
Whether or not this is a dumb move is going to come down to pricing. If the Eris is dirt cheap ($49 or less with contract), then it will still be a decent option for anybody who wants a decent-if-outdated smartphone without spending a ton. Verizon will probably screw it up and charge too much, but lets at least wait until they make that mistake before we blame them for it.
Yup. Different phones fro different segments under one branding label. You know, like Apple does with the Touch, Classic, Nano and Shuffle in the PMP market.
There's no point Verizon trying to cannibalise it's own sales by producing two flagship models.
Lower cost alternative?
why build low cost alternatives to powerful phones? buy a smartphone or dont, why seek a less powerful and much slower option?
its the idea that you can make a quick buck off building cheap crap that pushes useless phones forward. On the consumer end is saving that 50 bucks really worth the trade off?
because the Hero may be cheap, but it is certainly not crap.
@Xorex
It would be a dumb business move to have only expensive smartphones in your line up and the dumbphones to cover the rest of the market.
It only makes sense to have models that easy people into jumping on the smartphone bandwagon - this is what the carriers want after all as it get their customers more than likely paying for data plans.
Also you have low cost PCs and high end PCs. Not everything needs to be high end or nothing at all.
If the Droid is launched at $200, this could be a $150 or possibly $100 offering. A price like that might make the smaller screen, slower processor, and older firmw.... nevermind, still not worth it.
At $50 it might be. There's a chance (albeit a minuscule one) that this could even be free with contract. They'd take a hit on the subsidy, but that would certainly get a LOT of people to choose an android smartphone over an iphone or pre. Then, once they've got people hooked on android and annoyed at the Qualcom's lethargy, they can sell them a Droid (or more likely its successor) the next time around.
To be honest, I don't have much faith that Verizon is that smart, but it's not impossible.
If indeed this running 1.5 now, it won't be for long. This phone has virtual buttons (ie. their trigger comes by touching certain coordinates on the capacitative surface). You need 2.0 to handle that properly. Look at this for proof: http://developer.android.com/sdk/android-2.0.html#api-changes (just down to "Key events executed on key-up").
WTF, in a world of emerging 1ghz processors how does ANYONE think they can get away with this nonsense? If you want to get ahead in the game the formula is simple DONT REGRESS when building handsets.
550 + mhz or bust.
If they happen to make it free on contract, that would be a pretty sweet deal though..maybe even for 50. But other than that you're completely right.
The HTC needs to come out with a singing version of the Android phone. They can call it the hymn-roid.
I hope they forgot a 1 before 5..
Wow, all Engadget had to do was mention Android 1.5 and 528mhz for this device to be a non-starter.
Device needs to be prices competitively (sub-$100) in order to serve as an entry-level Android device.
There has to be a real price difference between the Droid and the Droid Eris in order for the launch of both of these devices at the same time to make sense. Hopefully, this doesn't mean that the Droid is some crazy expensive price.
Give us Éclair... or at least Donut....
sick
Not only is Sprint's Hero prettier, but their plans are infinitely better.
Any Mobile, Anytime trumps MyFaves, Friends & Family, and A-List.
oh it does, if you are covered by Native Sprint towers, but a nice chunk of their coverage up here (PA) are roaming on verizon, meaning any mobile anytime doesn't count, and no 3g.
Sprint's prices are very attractive, but they're losing customers for a reason.
droid does what idont
pretty nice handset, prefer the htc hd2 though with some winmob.
I don't mind seeing it, so long as its a low cost entry device, something thats going to help get more users into the smart phone market without spending over $100. Or, it just could be some sort of contract requirement that they offer so many different models at launch?
I think engadget is posting the wrong picture for the Eris. Consider whats being pictured at Phandroid here ...
http://phandroid.com/2009/10/27/verizon-starts-htc-droid-eris-training-november-10th-launch/
What they are picturing here I suspect is the Passion, which is supposed to be the snapdragon Android device.
http://phandroid.com/2009/10/25/htc-passion-to-continue-verizon-android-party/
Time will tell all I guess.
You are wrong. How can you look at both of those pictures and think they are not the same phone?
Look again at the two links you posted. Specifically, compare the picture of the phone in the second link to the phone posted by Engadget here.
@Kyle, truth but the first pic he linked to is the same phone Mr. Eric Schmidt was holding in the original press photo. So I'll say unless there has been an in design Engadget posted the wrong phone.
If I didn't know any better, I'd say HTC over-ordered 528 mhz chips from Qualcomm and are now manufacturing bullshit phones just to get rid of them. Why can't they go back to TI and do it big like Moto?
Something that everyone here seems to forget is that we are not the average consumer. The average person does not walk into their local Verizon, Sprint, AT&T or T-Mobile store and ask what processor is in the phone.
If for some reason they do, and the manager at the store has any idea what the processor speed is, the average person will not think there is any discernible difference between the 528Mhz processor in the Eris and the 550Mhz processor in the Droid. They won't know or understand the difference between ARM 11 and ARM 8 processors. Why does nobody seem to understand this?
This phone has the potential to sell better than the Droid. Sense UI is more appealing than stock Android. Therefore, since I believe Verizon would be shooting themselves in the foot if they price the Droid over $200, I believe the Droid will sell for $199 and the Eris will sell for $179, but no less than $150.
This tbqh
Uh...
Why not just face the fact the Verizon, Google and HTC could care less that someone is signing a two-year contract for an obsolete phone as long as they're making the sale.
That's showbiz!
Well, I definitely hope more average consumers buy this phone cause it means that I can get a Droid.
There's a HUGE risk that the average consumer who would have his/her first encounter with Android on such a crappy hardware wouldn't think twice before writing Android off and concluding that the iPhone is much better than "that Google phone".
Not a very good introduction to Android for many people this is!
@Maddy ... um... crappy hardware? Thats basically the same phone as the Hero which is by all accounts *far* from crappy.
@kyle:
First, you're right, the average consumer isn't interested in what CPU his phone has. That however is no excuse to me for not making products better. I bet it's al about the money. Since this CPU is still used in so many devices the price/unit must be extremely low by now.
Second, you can't argue taste. I, for example, like the stock android better over any custom interface because it's simple and doesn't look bloated.
@McPOW, I own the G1 and speak based what I have used for more than a year. It was borderline alright when it was released last year, but now it's just antique. Even at that time, I knew HTC and T-Mobile tried to cut corners in hardware, but since they took this big risk of being the first ones to release Android to the masses, they had to be rewarded.
1 year later, they have no excuse. That damned processor is over 5 years old. And there's no way in hell it can decently run Flash videos in the browser when it releases early next year, irrespective whether it's running Android 2.0 or not.
Why buy a phone which is going to be obsoleted within just a couple of months? Hell, even Apple notorious for planned obsolescence lets their products be "latest" at least for a year.
Boooooooooooo
I'm dying to test capacitive responsiveness on this. This will determine it's succes.
Cuz If it's not as fast as say 3gs doubt will get far.
Someone needs to go blow up HTC's stash of these old, stupid MSM72xx processors.
So I may be being dense here but why couldn't the software be upgraded?
It could.
Seriously though, who is going to bother?
Hey engadget, there are new photos of the Droid Eris out and the photo you have is not the eris, or at least not the most current prototype. Check out the link for a photo of the Droid Eris which confirms that the photo in Schmidt's hand was indeed the HTC Droid Eris and not a mystery phone.
http://www.androidguys.com/2009/10/27/verizon-reps-getting-trained-on-droid-eris/
I think they still use a 528mhz cpu still because it's cheap and it can run android as intended. My phone has a 400mhz cpu and it can run android nearly as fast..I'm also gunna be booting the sdk 2.0 shortly. Usually with android RAM is the biggest limitations so far, especially with rosie but sure a faster cpu..means better media device for sure..though you still get a decent andoid phone and you get what you pay for..200-300$ unlocked android phones with out contract..heck maybe 150$.
So all the hanging and choppy transitions were intended?
What's the gdgt logo doing there? Are those guys still your evil overlords?
Old + old = no money for HTC, sorry.
That 528Mhz CPU is like the atom n270: everybody wants something newer and better but they keep throwing the same old shit to our heads.
And while I can understand the 528Mhz CPU somehow (You can't change the CPU that easily), what's your excuse for android 1.5 HTC? Android 1.6 is out for some time and 2.0 is about to hit other devices.
It's hard to get excited for a phone that's coming out for the 4th time with less features than the original version.
If you are going to name a phone after the goddess of discord and chaos, you should have a good processor in it. just saying.
Hail Eris!!!
They want a keyboardless option at launch and there aren't any Android 2.0 devices to fit that bill yet, so they're filling it with the perfectly competent and much-loved HTC Hero. Seems perfectly reasonable to me.
Not really sure why you think this is adequate. Every version of this phone has been plagued with the same problems (lag and such), I think Verizon would almost be better off just releasing the Droid alone unless this phone comes out super cheap (no more than $50 on a new contract).
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH......come on man, I was soooo excited to get an Android that was NOT made by motorola and then you go and F everything up HTC........either come out with snapdragon by the end of this year or fall on your sword.
has anyone noticed that verizon's data plan for $30 doesn't include Exchange support? You've got to upgrade to the $45 plan to get that. the iPhone does the exchange thing for $30.
i'm hoping verizon releases some new plans to go along with android, cause they're not too competitive at the moment. you can't even get a family plan for smartphones.
Carriers have to make each phone better than the last, doesnt always mean making the next phone better, can mean making the 'now' one worse. Case in point-TMobile has cliq and mt3g, mt3g had 288mb ram as the magic, but then the cliq wouldnt be an improvement over the mt3g, other than having sense ui but mt3g(with 288mb ram) would run it better than the cliq anyway so mt3g gets 192mb ram, and the cliq has something to brag about. Maybe verizon had eris coming out then perhaps sony got pushed up(lets pray on tmobile) so verizon cant put droid out after sony since droid has worse specs, so they get the eris out of the way and push the droid as the best, most powerful android phone, trying to get the consumers who are looking for a capable phone that wont be so far behind the android pack (once droid and sony drop the androids of now will be great phones but the hardware wont compare) but im not a smart guy so this is probably way off...the main point, obviously is that tmobile better be the carrier of the sony infinity or im going to throw a fit in front of my wife's family at christmas.
i don't think you know what the hell your talking about my sister got the cliq and its has a hell i was shocked beyond belief and super responsive its like an ascending being compared to the G1 and mt3g clearly Motorola can make a phone a hell of a lot better than HTC for that huge gap in performance between the 3
It was a genius move on Verizon's part to secure the "Droid" name/rights. It will allow them to separate themselves from the other handsets on the market/carriers.
http://www.droidforums.net
The Eris will be introduced, reportedly, at $100 so my guess is even though it's the old 528 processor and 1.5, it will be for the budget conscious. The Motorola will come out for more money but will still be Motorola CRAP!!! Lest us not forget the Razr? Motorola will have the nice software but the gear will still be junk.
The one to wait for will be the HTC and should be dubbed "Passion". Looking like the HD2 body but with Eclair 2.0 and Snapdragon processor. Cost aside, this will be the phone to have. And for anyone bitching about a 4.3" screen, get a bigger hand. LOL!!