11/30/11 - John McKean Blog - Amazon Kindle Fire 18 Nov 2011
The Amazon Kindle Fire $199 is a game-changer--a gadget with potential to irrevocably alter a sector of the market to the point of no return. A fully-fledged Android tablet with a top-level ecosystem of multimedia content for less than half the price of its competitors isn't just changing the game, it's changing the entire sport.
The long-awaited, 7-inch color display, 431g, Android 2.3 Gingerbread tablet with custom Amazon user interface, & Silk browser which Amazon has been diligently plotting for the last couple of years, arrives at the perfect time with the tablet arena at a crossroads.
No buttons on the face of the device, no volume switches or screen locks--a really clean look. The power button, close to the headphone jack and the MicroUSB charging port, is the only physical button to be found. Two tiny speakers rest at the top of the device.
-No cameras - front or back. No GPS sensor. It is a media consumption device, not a means for communication (no microphone either) or navigation.
-No room for an external SD card slot.
-No 3G data connectivity, Bluetooth, GPS, the Android Market, greater internal storage (and the option of external storage) were made to keep costs to a minimum.
-The lack of native Google-built apps is a problem and the privacy issues that arise with using the Silk browser is something to keep an eye on.
1GHz dual-core Texas Instruments OMAP processor, same as Blackberry PlayBook. The Kindle Fire, like the iPad, only has 512MB of RAM, compared to 1GB on PlayBook and most Honeycomb tablets
Only 8GB of internal storage, which equates to just 6.54GB of usable memory--keep everything in the cloud.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 offers a Tegra 2 chipset, but it remains 1GHz dual-core at its heart.however, .
Refreshing Amazon user interface, display, touchscreen and built-in eco-system of content are better than they have any right to be at this price.
The buying experience is perfect and the ability to keep everything in the cloud does its best to negate the paltry 8GB hard-drive. We were also really impressed with the first iteration of the Silk browser, which is likely to get better.
Battery life 5 hours--disappointing.
The Amazon Kindle Fire $199 astonishingly good value for money; perhaps the best gadget bargain of this era. A brilliant media consumption device that doesn't break the bank. It's a solid tablet perfectly tailored to its aim of pushing you to buy digital content from Amazon.
The Amazon Kindle Fire $199 is a game-changer--a gadget with potential to irrevocably alter a sector of the market to the point of no return. A fully-fledged Android tablet with a top-level ecosystem of multimedia content for less than half the price of its competitors isn't just changing the game, it's changing the entire sport.
The long-awaited, 7-inch color display, 431g, Android 2.3 Gingerbread tablet with custom Amazon user interface, & Silk browser which Amazon has been diligently plotting for the last couple of years, arrives at the perfect time with the tablet arena at a crossroads.
No buttons on the face of the device, no volume switches or screen locks--a really clean look. The power button, close to the headphone jack and the MicroUSB charging port, is the only physical button to be found. Two tiny speakers rest at the top of the device.
-No cameras - front or back. No GPS sensor. It is a media consumption device, not a means for communication (no microphone either) or navigation.
-No room for an external SD card slot.
-No 3G data connectivity, Bluetooth, GPS, the Android Market, greater internal storage (and the option of external storage) were made to keep costs to a minimum.
-The lack of native Google-built apps is a problem and the privacy issues that arise with using the Silk browser is something to keep an eye on.
1GHz dual-core Texas Instruments OMAP processor, same as Blackberry PlayBook. The Kindle Fire, like the iPad, only has 512MB of RAM, compared to 1GB on PlayBook and most Honeycomb tablets
Only 8GB of internal storage, which equates to just 6.54GB of usable memory--keep everything in the cloud.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 offers a Tegra 2 chipset, but it remains 1GHz dual-core at its heart.however, .
Refreshing Amazon user interface, display, touchscreen and built-in eco-system of content are better than they have any right to be at this price.
The buying experience is perfect and the ability to keep everything in the cloud does its best to negate the paltry 8GB hard-drive. We were also really impressed with the first iteration of the Silk browser, which is likely to get better.
Battery life 5 hours--disappointing.
The Amazon Kindle Fire $199 astonishingly good value for money; perhaps the best gadget bargain of this era. A brilliant media consumption device that doesn't break the bank. It's a solid tablet perfectly tailored to its aim of pushing you to buy digital content from Amazon.
Excerpted from www.techradar.com article: "Amazon Kindle Fire review, Can Amazon's astonishingly-priced tablet live up to the hype?" 18 Nov 2011
