Sprint customers and Europeans who have unlocked versions of the HTC Hero have been granted an over-the-air Android Eclair update. HTC is not leaving other Hero owners high and dry either because an official ROM upgrade can be downloaded directly from its servers.

The 80.4Mb Eclair file is hosted on HTC servers, so you can trust that it is secure. Remember to back up all of your data before installing the ROM. Locked versions of the Hero from Telus, Rogers, O2, etc. are not receiving the vanilla HTC ROM. Those versions need to be specifically updated with carrier restrictions.

Here is a perfect example of Android fragmentation. HTC has finished the stock Hero ROM, but because the phone is available through so many carriers around the world, each version needs to have its own unique edition. Indeed Sprint’s 2.1 upgrade arrived weeks ago.