Verizon Droid

Venture Beat compares between the two Droid phones. Here are some parts of their review:

With so much hype going to the Motorola Droid, it’s almost easy to overlook the second Droid phone, HTC’s Droid Eris, which also launched this week. It’s like a younger sibling standing in the shadow, but with the price tag of only $99.99 (after $100 mail-in rebate), it’s bound to catch the attention of many price-conscious buyers. Using Android 1.5, the Droid Eris might not have the same oomph as its older sibling (Motorola operates on Android 2.0). However, it’s still packed with many solid Android features.

HTC headlines the Eris’ customizable features and touts it as the “perfect weekend, travel or pure play phone.” Since I was taking a weekend roadtrip, I decided to put my phone to the test. What I found is that Eris does offer a lot of customizable fun. For example, the seven screens that you can easily scroll through are easily modified to your liking. I was able to organize my social networks, favorite people, and favorite apps all in groupings on different screens.
Listening to and organizing music on Eris is also easy. I browsed music through the Amazon mp3 app and since I already had an Amazon account, purchasing was just a one step process. Once on your phone you can take a song and crop it however you like and make it your main (or specific contact) ringtone.
Another thing I might mention, for those who like to mix business with pleasure, Eris comes preinstalled with Quickoffice, a PDF viewer, the ability to sync with POP3 email accounts, and it will let you keep current with corporate mail and such with Microsoft Exchange Active Sync.
Despite the Droid Eris’ many playful features and business tools, there are a few minor idiosyncrasies that might have me returning my purchase and shelling out the extra money for the sexy sibling (who I’m supposed to be ignoring right now).
The first obvious frustration for me is the lack of a physical keyboard. My previous phone, the LG enV Touch, spoiled me with its keyboard, making texting something I could almost do with my eyes closed. The Droid Eris offers a touch screen with a virtual keyboard. Though I’ve never been accused of having pudgy fingers, the sensitive and cramped keys make me feel like my fingers have been retaining water.
It could also be said that dialing on the Eris is a little too easy. Just ask my boyfriend who received four accidental phone calls in a row while he was in a meeting! Since it only requires one touch to set a phone call into motion, a steady hand and small fingers would be needed to select and dial the correct person on the first try.
Another disappointment is the lack of Google Maps Navigation, which only runs on Android 2.0. True, I was able to find a cheap GPS app for my Droid Eris, but it is primitive in comparison to Google’s app. In order to install an app almost comparable to Google’s, I would have been required to spend between $30 and $85, and doing that would have rendered my original frugality pointless.
In the end, because of the simultaneous launch date, it is impossible not to compare the two phones. During the purchase process of my phone the salesperson indicated that the Eris would be upgradeable to 2.0, but he couldn’t say when. If this proves to be the case, then perhaps at some future date the upgrade might close the gap of difference between the phones. Until then, those who expect the Eris to be a Mini-me of the Motorola Droid are going to be disappointed. However, those who keep in mind that these phones are brothers from another mother or sisters from a different mister, will understand that they’ve inherited different traits.

BGR has a new shot of the HTC Droid Eris: “Overall the same as the Sprint Hero but for some reason it seems faster, slightly thinner and taller.” Otherwise it “seems the same” and is running Android 1.5. The Droid Eris will be powered by a 528MHz Qualcomm CPU.