I hope I haven’t got your hopes up, the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 and Dell Streak aren’t getting an update to Android 2.2 Froyo, but instead are finally playing catchup and getting Android 2.1 Eclair.

For those of you already basking in the warmth of Froyo (bit of a mixed metaphor there sorry) the idea of only just getting upgraded to Android 2.1 must be unthinkable, but for those of you who are stuck in the dark ages of 1.6, it will feel like a miracle.

A bit like going from 2.1 to 2.2, a lot of the changes are barely noticeable, but are nonetheless extremely useful. Much of the work goes on behind the scenes, where the hardware of your phone will be put to use much more efficiently, resulting in improved speeds and battery life.

Outside of this, you will find little tweaks to the UI and some of the built-in Android apps, as well as some smoothing over of known software and hardware issues.

All of this will add up to making your phone even more usable and allowing you to get much more out of it.

The Dell Streak should be the first out of these two to experience 2.1 Eclair, with the release expected anytime from 1st September onwards. Those of you with Sony Ericsson Xperia X10s, or thinking of getting one should be getting your update to Eclair by the end of September at the latest.

GET THE SE XPERIA X10 READY FOR ANDROID ECLAIR

GET THE DELL STREAK READY FOR ANDROID ECLAIR

Fixes:
• Clock widget displaying time for the same city in a different state

• YouTube, “Cannot play video” error

• Intermittent Unable to Receive SMS

• Picturemail “Download Unsuccessful” error

• Clock widget displaying inaccurate times

• Some recurring calendar events display daily after first occurrence

• Text conversations merged/mislabeled

• Emails forwarded from menu option do not include attachments

Feature Enhancements:

• Quick Contact feature.

• Search SMS/MMS

• Bookmarks with web page thumbnails.

• Support for double-tap zoom.

• Support for HTML5

• Calendar: Agenda view provides infinite scrolling. Events indicate the attending status for each invitee.

• Bluetooth 2.1

• Out of Office Assistant

• User configurable synchronization windows

• Additional widgets

• Improved Home Tile Navigation